One emperor. One guy indicacts that he is some random stranger, not a military genius.
Also as Alduin said, the Altmer lost their main force to their own arrogance... all it would've taken is one scout. One scout and they would've wiped out the Empire... makes me sad.
I have to disagree with you, Alduin, about human commanders being better. For single battles they probably are, but humans never see the big picture, whereas the elves do. So IMO, elves are better commanders as the war > single battle.