StarCraft II for Age of Empires Players: Part I (Game Design & Analysis)

Hey folks,

I've been working on a large comparative analysis between my favorite RTS series, Age of Empires, and a game I've been playing a ton lately, StarCraft II. This is the first of (probably) two parts.

Production notes:
-- ELO ratings cited for launch of Age of Empires 3 based on community ladder which used the same ELO formula as Age of Empires 2 and sourced win / loss data from an Ensemble-provided API.

References:
-- http://www.gamespy.com/pc/age-of-myth...
-- http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/201...
-- http://artho.com/age/aoefish.html (interview with Ian Fischer)
-- https://www.amazon.com/dp/0782127711 (Age of Empires Scenario Design Toolkit)
-- http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/bli... (Mike Morhaime interview)
-- http://venturebeat.com/2016/02/25/how... (Bruce Shelly interview)
-- https://www.amazon.com/dp/1556229127 (Side Meier Interview)
-- http://us.battle.net/forums/en/sc2/to... (game speed community update)
-- http://aoe3.heavengames.com/interview... (pre-aoe3 interview with ES)
-- https://github.com/Blizzard/s2protocol (official sc2 replay parser)
-- http://www.agecommunity.com/press.asp... (Age of Empires III two million copies sold)
-- http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/blog/5202... (talking balance with David Kim)
-- http://www.shacknews.com/article/6017... (Battle.net interview)
-- http://www.agecommunity.com/aoeinterv... (various Ensemble interviews)
-- http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/201... (StarCraft II sales)
-- http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2... (38 balance patches for SC2)