Which faction provides the biggest test?

[ReluctantSamurai]

Leadership was terrible...Support: 2 generals just behind, but the ellies were taking so long to get to grips I had to deal with action elsewhere and they had routed by the time I got back.

So fail on the two biggest rules regarding ellies. Any wonder why they underperformed?

Two general units is meager support to begin with...and they went elsewhere temporarily, leaving the ellies essentially without support. Ellies are far slower than cavalry, and you have to take that into consideration. When I echelon a cav unit behind them, I send the ellies off first, and when they are about halfway to their target I send the cav. The ellies get a short time to rumble about after their initial impact, and then the cav hit. The ellies are then backed out of the line to regroup. It's a deadly combo.

Update on my Cavalry Commander of Genius: Still no more kids after 10 years.

Bad luck of the draw

And speaking of your Cavalry Commander of Genius...why weren't the ellies under his direct command? That's a 10 star leader and the kind you need to command elephants

35yrs into the game is not enough time in my experience. It's usually the second or third generation that gets the 16 year old military genius.