This is interesting. You raise mostly the same points as previous posters, yet the frame is radically different.
First of all, I don’t think I agree with you, but the truth of the matter has to be confirmed in the tournament results of the coming year. A few reactions:
-Fearless is useless in melee. Yes, true. But the fact that undead don’t waver makes them almost invulnerable to shooting. Combined with the fact that shooting will nearly always waver a unit instead of routing it, makes this rule very valueable.
-Shambling has taken a drop, true. Fortunately the undead command (which is ridiculously easy to pull off) helps a lot. This gives undead the best of both worlds.
-Undead nerve is fine. Revenants have 25, cheapo’s dropped a little.
-Rev king is useless, I grant you that. The rally is okay, but not worth the point cost.
-Necromancers have nothing special, but they are your primary access to surge which we do need. I take a necro + inspiring talisman first every army I build. Army standard with tome second. That gives me 2 sources of command + inspiring + surge for less than 250 points.
-Foot vampires have been tested (see above) and they failed me. They do quite a bit of damage (vicious helps) but their limited nerve compared to their point cost doesn’t warrant their inclusion. They need a serious point drop (to 150 for a troop, 180-ish for a regiment) for me to consider them.
-Undead regulars being useleess: In the few battles I played (again, see above) I lacked hordes of regular shamblers. My next iteration of the list will include 3 hordes of zombies. Dirt cheap and a lot of nerve to kill off. Yes, they die fast to berserker infantry, but cavalry will have nothing to add from their thunderous, so that’s a great bonus. It’s almost as good as spears at a fraction of the cost! Undead has always been a combination of cheap disposables and heavy hitters, this remains more or less the same. Yes, I’d like some more fancy commands and the return of the liche character, but then again, we haven’t lost as much as other lists. (looking at you, Brotherhood of both kinds)
So I’m pretty set on undead right now, if only because it’s the army I transitioned first to KoW 4th. First master this one before continuing to others.