Boring; composing my army/SoD isn't simply an exercise in quantity. Firstly, I have to consider what type of troops my enemy is using. If cavalry is predominant in my opponent's arsenal, then spearmen/pikemen are necessary, in numbers, for stack defense. How large does the stack need to be? It depends on how large my opponent's army is. Is his army turtled up in a border city? Then I might want to hit it first, making the rest of the conquest quicker and easier. If that's the case, then it might be advisable to include a larger siege component. Is speed essential? Then my army should be primarily mounted. I don't find this kind of problem-solving boring at all.
Stupid; see above. Not an overstatement to say that intelligence is required to increase the probability of success.
Unrealistic; Not at all. Prior to the Napoleonic era, I can think of only two exceptions to this rule--a nation/empire's military might was marshalled into one large force, and operated accordingly. Whether we are talking about Frederick the Great or Assurbanipal, an army was the operative element in military activity. The two exceptions were the Mongol toumans and the Roman legions. The Mongols invaded Kwarism and the Sung state with 3 armies on both occasions. The Romans divided their legions into small armies very often, however, when the Romans fought a prolonged war, they combined many legions into a large army. Trajan used 10 legions when he invaded Dacia. Marcus Aurelius used 8 to fight the Marcomannic War.
In military theory, Concentration of Force is a well-known concept, and the army/SoD exemplifies it well.
Infinite; exaggeration. Historically, there have been VERY large armies created, even in the pre-modern periods. Darius' force at Arbela was immense, yet Alexander defeated this giant army with a skilled deployment of a combined arms force--see the first paragraph above. Or read a translation of Arrian. Penguin copies are inexpensive.
All that said, the idea of limitations is good. Terrain and habitation seem to be the primary limiting factors in pre-modern warfare. The Roman legions had no real logistic apparatus, allowing the soldiers to either forage or purchase their grain from local people--but there had to BE local people with grain to sell. Look at any map of Imperial Rome at its height and then apply this idea. The border stopped where food supplies stopped. Germania being the only exception. Terrain absolutely should be a limiting factor. Taking a large stack across an expanse of desert tiles IS certainly unrealistic. The solution would be to assign a support factor to specific types of tiles, augmented by habitation levels. Heavily populated grasslands/floodplains/plains should be able to support high military concentrations, whereas empy deserts should NOT be able to do so, with unit attrition, either hit points, or outright unit elimination, being the result of an attempt to cross such. Following out this idea, techs called "Plunder" and "Depots" in the early modern era (1500-1800) would allow armies some flexibility in terms of support, the former negative, impacting populations and economies, with the latter positive, with no adverse effects, but more limits. After 1800, industrial techs (Steam power, Assembly line, etc. and possibly a "Logistics" tech) would allow greater flexibility still.
I understand the rancor regarding stacks, but see further refinement of the idea as a solution, not elimination in favor of a wholly inadequate and inapplicable tactical system in its place. MO.
All that said, there is another element that I see missing from these polarized discussions; the middle ground. These discussions, more especially the theoretical discussions regarding possible fixes to the current state of CiV combat, seem to be a typical false dilemma fallacy--EITHER SoD, OR 1upt. In most of my late game wars, I do not use SoD at all, but instead build a very large military and invade on a broad front. Units do often coalesce around enemy cities when they turtle up, concentrating prior to the assault, but often move in 2 unit stacks, often with inf/art as a combined unit. Used carefully this approach can and DOES work, and it avoids the peril of a single cat appearing and hitting the army/SoD thereby doing lots of damage to lots of units. Identifying WHERE the enemy stack is located and disposing adequate force to counter it is necessary as well, but using the Broad Front strategy has proven very effective. Late game wars, including continental domination campaigns can progress with extraordinary speed. (I play habitually on Noble, huge continental maps, marathon speed)
