I can echo this, no matter what army comp you use it always feels worse than other factions and the high elf chariots are straight up OP against any form of infantry.

TL;DR: 6 handguns, 3 deck gunners, 1 caster, queen bess, 5 sireens, 3 gunnery wights.

Here's what worked very well for me (VH/Normal):

1) 6 gunnery mob handguns, 3 deck gunners. Rush research to increase range and damage of these units, including the follower ones. Build deck gunner building on LL.
2) Queen Bess.
3) 3 gunnery wights - they increase ammo, damage and range of handguns, deck gunners and Queen Bess. Damage and ammo skills stack, select range increase only with one gunnery wight. They also have useful support abilities, decent damage, can block enemy infantry while your missile units shoot them. They can restock ammo for Queen Bess - restock when you lose extra powder buff. Build gunnery wight building in cap; choose to get gunnery wight on event for second one; build 1 cove building for 3rd one.
4) 1 caster - vampire preferred for heal and wind of death, deeps is fine also, for kraken pull.
5) 5 sireens - to protect from flanks and block incoming units head on. They don't do much damage at all, but they are fast-ish and reliably hold enemies in place while your gunners shoot them.

I sent out 1 Vamp captain early on to build pirate coves - Lothern, Altdorf, Marienburg (risky, norsca danger), Hag Graef, Naggarond, etc. Puts you in a hole at first, but pays off soon.

Experienced very little casualties in every battle. Deck gunners can melt Gor-Rok before he touches you.

I recommend using Alt+mouse click to target spots with high concentration of enemies with Queen Bess during sieges, not click on specific units. More efficient. You can easily get 1-1,5k kills when gunnery wights refill your ammo.

Other armies can do similar build or just go straight for Necrofex spam.

That is all.

Well Lolalus, first of all thank you for taking the time to write such a lovely strategy. But im afraid that does not change the problem. I took the time to test the "opposite" site, which confirms my first post. Playing as teclis atm for example is a no brainer, even with standart archer and spear troops, the fella melts to almost every enemy. Maybe it sounded like a complaint/cry post, but i wanted to state a balance problem :)

I've got the same feeling as OP. Playing on Luthor Harkon Vortex VH/N (Vanilla I beat campaigns L/N, but I can't handle legendary in SFO due to how much more powerful and thus more important spells are...got to slow mo from time to time sadly).

I'm mid game now. Luthor and one of the tech admirals both have tier V ships and various recruitment buildings.The problems exist on multiple fronts. Against Markus, his ranged just melts everything I bring. His units out range and out damage my ranged even with tech and lord skill upgrades. Tier V depth guard and Tier IV boarding crew can't even close ranks without being melted. Depth guard are such crap in SFO with their tiny unit size and subpar stats. I don't understand why they are so expensive. I could have another lord with a stack of zombie chaff for the cost of a few depth guard. Total balance fail. And then there is the boarding crew. Tier IV garbage. 2 turns to recruit and the cost? Again, I'll just bring another lord with a stack of chaff for the same price and more effect. So boring.

On the other front with the lizards, its ok if they bring a mid game infantry heavy army (no temple guard) due to how slow they are and how easy it is to bog them down with zombies. But any sort of large just can't be held or pinned down. And due to the ♥♥♥♥ looseness formations of the entirety of the pirate's ranged units they get much more adversely affected by line of sight and terrain issues than their skaven or empire or dwarf counterparts. No checkerboard. No tight anti-large infantry.

The whole faction just doesn't play "right". If the idea is to swarm with cheap raise dead units and replaceable troops, then why does raise dead have such a pathetic pool and why are the higher tier units so expensive? This approach basically nullifies veterancy (and red line lord skills), so going up against gold chevron stacks every turn requires a 2:1 advantage. That would be fine if a depth guard didn't cost 2300+ to recruit and 3 turns...

If we assume the opposite, that the army is meant to survive and gain veterancy and hold 1:1 against another doomstack then why are the units garbage compared to their equivalent units against specifically Markus and Gor Rok?

I stand by my described army build.

What out-ranges tech and skill (lord and gunnery wight) boosted deck gunners? Certainly not any other missile unit except artillery. There are ways to deal with artillery. Never mind deck gunners, handguns also out-range archers. I don't get it, I always melt any dangerous units before they can do much harm to me, not the other way around.

Melee has always been crap, SFO or vanilla. They are there to block enemy units so your ranged can blast them. Don't try to close ranks, wait to be engaged by enemy melee while your range melts their range. I agree, depth guard are disappointing. Sireens are the way. Infantry tend to blob up on them - use spells and artillery to kill them, or even move engaged sireens and/or range units to get a good line of sight. They also can pin down large units, including single entity. But they never need to hold them for long - your ranged unit will always have clear line of sight on all large units.

What puts me off is the tech costing both gold and infamy, they are all the same cost, which is bad because they are not all equal and whats worse, that all scales with the imperium costs.

But probably the worst thing is the office positions costing infamy per turn, 200 per turn to have them all staffed.

I play VC alot with SFO. The key part of your lineup is the Queen bess + some cannons/deck gunners and then anything that can summon units (deeps/vamp) and play like skaven - summon trash to bog them down and let the queen bess delete units. The most kills I have had with QB (in a siege, which are trivial with one) is 3k. The second army tends to be large units, with the same skaven tactic of summoning trash. I have had suprising success with mounguls as well - spawned with fleet footed and they can flank and kill artie with ease. I always play VH/VH.

The hints people give about playing VC here are not wrong, but VC's big problem is not that you can't have a single good army with Queen Bess.
Of course you can.

But only one.

In mid-late game, that's just not enough.
Your Queen Bess army will be near invincible, but you'll be fighting everyone on all sides at the same time (at least as Cylostra).
Lizards and/or Skaven from the south, grumpy elves from the NW, hippie elves from the north, other pirates from the east.

There's nowhere near enough income even if you build all income buildings you can and just entirely ignore settlement protection or unit production (terrible idea, but nvm). At best, you'll have two armies that can actually build Necrofex at the same time.
Treasure hunts are a bad joke and those events at sea (where you can fight to get up to 20k gold) way too rare to be a reliable source of income.

But you'll need 6-7 armies or more to even hold your ground, let alone make any gains.
It's not entirely impossible (playing on H/VH), but it is such a terrible slog compared to every other race.

You are constantly at war with all neighbors and cannot pull off what you can with other races - pulling back for a few turns in mid-late game to upgrade your armies to highest tier units.

What Vampire Coast do need is allies (let them be friendly with each other, or at least not outright hate each other) and maybe some techs to actually allow you to not be at war with everyone around you at the same time from turn 50 onwards or so.
Also, good lords or mounts that are not complete crap would help. Vampire Coast lords beyond your main lord are complete pushovers.