Yes. Consider the following combat.
Side A -- N peasants, M knights
Side B -- D dragons
where N >> M >> D (say D ~= 1, M ~= 10, and N > 100)
The combat looks (in general) like:
1) 4 * N/(N+M) peasants swing, and 4 * M/(N+M) knights swing, then
2) one dragon swings, then
3) repeat.
As N gets large, a larger and larger percentage of peasants start to
swing and fewer and fewer knights get a chance, so the stack's combat
effectiveness decreases.
Ed Bailey
P.S. I'll be happy to run some actual numbers, if this example isn't clear
in the abstract.
--
Ed Bailey | Voice: (512) 471-4198 Fax: (512) 471-6715
Inst. for Fusion Studies | Internet: bailey@{hagar,ziggy}.ph.utexas.edu,
Univ. of Texas at Austin | u70262@c.nersc.gov, or pnab643@chpc.utexas.edu
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