Board Thread:Lore Discussion/@comment-25343239-20150319182007/@comment-260563-20180324024227

And of course, a longer lifespan doesn't do much good in the battlefield. As a wise man once said, "it's not about who wins the most battles, it's about who wins the last." A longer lifespan means that for every Mer lost, the Thalmor have lost more than if the Imperials lose a Legionnaire. They lost an experienced combatant aged to perfection, whereas the humans lost someone that can easily be replaced.

Also, you speak of the Altmer delaying the next war for centuries? By that time, all the damage from the Great War and the Skyrim Civil War would have been fixed by Imperial coin and human birth rates. By that time, the Empire will have more than enough manpower to sweep the Dominion clean. Heck, if the Thalmor delay the war too long, the Empire will start one of their own. Coin and birth rates have a way of making a nation stronger. Especially if the Thalmor delay for decades, that's enough for the damage from the wars to be fixed and for the humans to raise new armies.

And unlike the Stormcloaks, the Imperials haven't ignored magic. The College of Whispers is practically creating their own Worm Cult to fight the next war, while the Synod is gathering magical objects of power. So come the next war, Imperial Battlemages will be raising undead armies and conjuring Daedra from Oblivion, while attacking the Thalmor with magic weapons of destruction.