The Other Shrek

I'm considering doing a Vampire army, but I'm getting hung up on leaders. I'm running Volga (got a whole spectral wolf thing going) and I like skeletons (honestly tempted to go full Barrow Weight, but vampire knights are cool), but I haven't played enough AoS to have a feel for what leaders/support to do. It seems like the army will end up split into a Wolf Wave (with basically just Volga to buff them) and a skeleton wave (with a Vampire Lord on foot or a Wight King, maybe a Necromancer). I could use Halgrim to speed them up, or am I underestimating the speed and utility of grave sites? If I just pop the skeletons out of graves, how do I get the non-summonable necromancer and vampire buffs to them?

So let's say I want to use Aggradons because the idea of dinosaurs riding dinosaurs has reawakened the 5 year old in me. How do I do it? I also want raptadons because they're cute and the synergy between the chargers and the hunters feels cool. For that matter, how would I go about building a list that isn't just the typical Thunder Lizards go brrrrr, but still has as much Jurassic Park going on as possible? By that I mean "what are ways to make a total Timmy, cavalry centric" list work? Ideally everything is mounted/monster (though if I'm not mistaken, the only riderless monster is the Dread Saurian and Troglodon?) or on a floating chair, with the only exceptions being a Spawn of Chotec (because who doesn't want a fire breathing dimetrodon), an astrolith bearer (because I too desire a Chapa'ai on a stick), maybe a single Saurus unit (I have the models from the starter, so...), and maybe the Hunters of Huanchi because they seem fun and, if I'm remembering the rules right, interact with Terrawings. (Sure, they lack riders, but they fit the vibe anyway.) Can this be done in Starborne?

Not 100% if this goes here, but I got some STLs off Lost Kingdom Miniatures and I'm not sure what to run them as. The trickiest are the Tengu and Owl Riders. The Tengu and Owls are in units of 3 and have 50mm senic bases. There's also an HQ Owl which is on a 60mm. The owl riders have bows and the tengu have staves; neither is heavily armored. With the wings, the models end up being more than 5" tall. Ideally I'd be able to run them alongside my Lumineth or Stormcast. Any suggestions? (There's also fox and weasel riders, but there's a lot more options for cavalry.)

Thanks for the ideas. I'm looking at doing Iliatha or Zaitrec. I like Syar's fluff (Elves who actually learn to chill out and make use of their reputation for arrogance?) but I'd like to build up to warp-coke abuse. I'm planning on starting with the stuff in the starter (picked that up during Corona) and the battleforce plus a Cathallar. A couple of questions: In general, when do I want to blob units? With Iliatha, I assume I generally want even numbers of units like Wardens, but with Zaitrec etc, are more wizards better or is the durability of a big squad preferable? (I'm not sure what the value of the trade-offs is. If it helps, I'm coming at this from 40k.) Is there any reason not to make something battleline if you can? (Does battleline get anything special like 40k objective secured?) Can you pile into and attack a unit you didn't charge? Like if I charge with Windchargers, pile in 6, can I end up away from the unit I charged in the first place and attacking something behind them?

A group at my FLGS is planning on starting up a Path To Glory Campaign and half the people are going to be new to wargaming. I'm still deciding on a faction, but I really like the phalanxes, cavalry, and impractical headware. I've heard that LR are kind of a terror at the moment, but looking over this thread, it seems like half of that is the Sentinels. If I avoid sentinel spam will that be friendly friendly or are LR one of those crush or be crushed factions atm?