To be fair, partial and annular eclipses are noticeable if you are looking for them, but they are absolutely nothing like a total eclipse, which really would feel like something apocalyptic if you were to experience it by surprise without understanding of what you were seeing or knowledge that it was temporary.
Yeah, there's definitely a huge difference between those two and a total eclipse but the assertion keeps coming up that ancient peoples wouldn't notice unless it was a total eclipse which is ridiculous.
Tactically yes it being a little dimmer doesn't directly weaken or strengthen a particular army. What is can do is affect morale given that events like this were shocking and often recorded as some kind of ill omen by people that saw them.
I saw the same eclipse in the zone of totality and I'm not sure I agree with you. You noticed something (a little less bright, a little colder) but only because you were expecting it. If you were not expecting the sun to do something unusual I think you'd either just not notice or put it down to some thin cloud cover moving over the sun. I say this because when viewing the total eclipse, things were pretty much normal, albeit a bit less than regular full sun brightness and temperature, until minutes before the onset of totality, so 95+% coverage.
It gets slightly darker, as if it's a bit overcast, but the effect is very subtle due to the logarithmic response of the eye. And it doesn't help to look at the sun because it's much too bright to see the shape.
What? The partial eclipse I saw in 2017 was easily noticeable by anyone who looked even remotely near the sun.