[larsdangly]

I would say some kind of alternative combat mechanics are needed once you have more than ~10-20 figures on the hex map. Beyond that, it is just too crazy to keep track of everything.

The main question all rpg's need to deal with for this issue is, do you create a proper 'game within a game' for resolving these larger conflicts (something as interesting and fun as dueling combat), or do you just slap an abstract resolution mechanic onto the game that gives you the answer to the question 'who won'. Lots of games have the latter, and I'd say none of them are interesting enough to be worth discussing. Of course D+D started with a proper game within a game in place - Chainmail remains a pretty good combat system for these purposes, and has enough overlap in terminology with D+D that you can kind of go back and forth between the two scales of play.