you can just keep passing the turn when there's a weak enemy to regain health and power for the group. after battle health should regenerate or be rethought a bit. add a bunch of stuns and I just sit there and regain everything before ending a battle.
the key to the hard badge: 2 schools training soldiers, 1 training scientists. I did it with only 2 scavenged items (a dog and a pistol I started with) so those weren't too important. It's more about leaving lots of soldiers to tend the base and getting the researches done.