Bear with me on this developers, I know you have heard the question, 'oh when's beta coming out' a billion and a half times, BUT, I have a different yet similar inquiry.
Is thinking of Alpha as focusing on skirmishes and core infantry combat (roughly) and Beta focusing on the larger battles and grander scheme mechanics (roughly) a good way to think of the two development stages? As vague and possibly inaccurate as those sound, they would answer a whole slew of questions for me on the development side of things and perhaps others as well.
The impression I'm getting is that you are structuring it around taking all of the smaller maps and mechanics, developing them by themselves, refining them with high volume concentrated player counts, then you will piece them together in the grander full map battles. Am I assuming too much?