@broker
Honestly, I think the basic problem is that, whatever game you design, the most competitive players will win it.
I've seen this so many times. From streetfighter to starcraft to 4x games to niche strategy titles lilke battlezone or, yes, Supreme commander.
At the end of the day, no matter what game people develop, the 'nerdiest', '"tryhard" players get the wins.
The only solution as a player is just to try harder and learn.
For a developer, it might seem like they could design a game that caters to more 'casual' players, but such a thing just doesn't exist - no matter how much designers 'simplify' a game, the most 'tryhard' players scoop up all the wins.
For example, games like 'zero k' are actually designed to ensure that the engine does all the hard work - the units in that game literally not only maintain max firing range, but micro their own dodging from incoming enemy attacks!
The result is always the same though - the combination of harder-trying, more experienced, and naturally more able/competitive players get all the wins.
Put another way -
- if the developer codes something that gives an advantage to players that do NOT micro their units, then top players will figure out exactly how long this window is, and play around it.
- If the game rewards players with economic advantage for NOT gaining economy, then top players will figure out how close to the line to ride.
- If the developer programs a 'beer chug' mechanic, that allows a player a 20-second 'beer chugging' advantage every 3 minutes, then top players will learn to hold back every 180 seconds to benefit.
End of the day, ALL games will always be dominated by the least 'casual', most competitive, players.
I think the best a 'casual' player, who intends to just relax and 'have fun' (whatever measure of 'fun' they choose to use), can do, is pick a game with matchmaking (generally, the more popular the better for matchmaking reasons), then play it at their favoured level, and be happy with their 50% win ratio.
Despite a relatively small community, FaF is large enough to reward a very roughly 50% win rate for whatever level of play.
Of course, extremely skilled players making "smurf" accounts COMPLETELY break this (which is why I hate smurfing in all its forms). (low-level Starcraft and league of legends, among many other games, got kinda ruined when great players were allowed to make new accounts for free, for this reason. Basically these 'masters playing bronze' players are good players intentionally breaking matchmaking algorithms in order to beat up on new players. Sadly, people still like and subscribe to every 'bronze to masters' video series that gets released.)
Luckily, FaF requires a paid account for every auto-matchmaking player, while still being small enough to discourage 'pro' gamers from spending pennies to feed their victory streams for views.
Ergo, FaF is very resistant to great players smurfing, and their tendency to ruin matchmaking.
So, long story short, just play casual games on matchmaking, and enjoy the mathematically-guided 50% win rate.