Restoring RTS to its Former Glory

Behold, aspiring developer! You knock on the door with yet another RTS. And I've seen them all - D&D based, historical fiction, and alien race alike. Before ye enter the gameosphere, beware! Observe these commandments…

1. Make the races distinct. Nobody wants tech trees nearly all in common, or else the game loses its variety. Of course, game balance is in the balance, but fix it up.
2. Make it easy to select the units you want. Let me group air, water, and land into functional units, but without me turning into a keyboard shortcut junkie. I shouldn't have to play more than 15 minutes of tutorial to figure it out.
3. Define the character's abilities without me having to load up on add-ons. Warcraft is completely inaccessible to me because I have to micromanage abilities. Decide on what units do in the first place.
4. Automate resource gathering, but also make it possible to do better than the computer. Villagers sitting around make me cry, and you can never let that happen. Give incentive to working for more resources, but don't make it hamper everything else.
5. Be creative, but don't trump the rush with something else. I know you might want to integrate some unit that may be creatively used for an advantage, but don't let someone run away with the game for it. Giving the Dark Archon mind control abilities probably isn't a good idea. The rush is fun and should usually win.
6. Most importantly, apply some AI expertise to the human player's experience. A rally point is convenient, but your unit might want to fire on an enemy before a stupid march into absolute death.

My favorite RTS of all time is C&C: Red Alert. The original, thank you very much. Probably most crucial to its success was that it didn't take itself seriously, with hilarious FMV and additional scenarios that were actually worth playing. It just made sense, matches took the right amount of time, and I remember many converging tank armadas. The game made sense, but through in a few nuke-toting civilians and ants to keep you on your toes.

I also love Starcraft. It is, not controversially, more polished a game than any C&C game, and nearly perfectly executed. But every time I play I hit a few gripes. Why can't I select more than 12 units at once? Why does the 'Toss kick so much ass? How come everybody amasses 10 times as many Hydralisks as I can make marines? Ok, maybe it's just because I suck at Starcraft. But nobody said this is an objective review…

I make this post because one really important RTS is soon to come: Starcraft II. In these last 10 years I haven't seen much development that's excited me. Red Alert 2/3 just makes me feel dumb - look at a Kirov or sink a destroyer with dolphins if you don't believe me. And as much as empire-building games have advanced, they sometimes encourage more historical lore than ass-kicking fast-paced gaming. Please deliver good mechanics (ok, and charm) to the genre.

Lastly, because this is a music site, make the audio good. Make the pacing fun, and don't loop one track like the previous Starcraft incarnation.