Starcraft is not the best in it's genre because I like it more. It's the best because it is the best.

Also, you comment about units favoured in Starcraft and that it's gameplay is Rock Paper Scissors I as a die hard RTS player find very ignorant. In starcraft there are no units that completely obliterates other units. Armor and pathing play a role to give units certain advantages over others, but no unit will completely mow down other units (except air vs melee). As for units being favoured I can think of none, Siege tanks are used almost always as the main attack unit in TvP and TvT, but have you ever seen a TvZ? There the stimmed marine is the main attack unit, and almost all other units serves their purposes. Also if we talk about units being favoured, how about the Paladin in AoE2? Also, Terran being overpowered? Are you seriously saying a race in Starcraft is overpowered? Every race have at some point dominated korean gaming tournaments, and that's because of the players not what race they played.

With that out of the way. The things starcraft absolutely pwns any "Age of" game is pacing and mechanics. In starcraft every unit plays in a completely different way, and thus must be microed in a completely different way. In Aoe there are melee units and ranged units. They play very similar all of them when compared to the diversity found in Starcraft. The difference in mutalisk micro and tank micro is much more significant than say paladin micro and archer micro. Also, the difference in mutalisk mechanics and lurker mechanics is greater than any unit differences in all the games you mentioned.

I fail to see how a game like age of empires can have more options than Starcraft since all the races in AoE basicaly play the same exept for some tweaks here and there. There are games that may be broader, but no game is deeper than Starcraft. Another thing about the AoE games is that the automatic formations mess up Micromangement. AoE is a series that strive to achieve immersion with it's be-the-god-and-rule-a-civilization setting, and sure, Starcraft isn't as immersive (unless you are playing a long game on Iccup and gather all of your concentration to win) but in terms of actual Gameplay, Starcraft wins.

I can't speak for company of heroes, but it sure does not have the same E-sport status that Starcraft has, so it's gameplay can't be superior. If the gameplay was exciting and diverse and skill-based on a Starcraft level, Korea would have adopted it.

I'm shocked that you didn't include WC3 in your list of games that you think is better, because that is the only game that has come close to Starcraft. But WC3 still falls flat in comparison because of it's hard-to-kill units and dumbed down macromangament.

"Also, Starcraft is just a 10+ year old game.  Its only natural tht another RTS would have come out to surpass it by now." I know, it's pretty sad that no game maker has been succesful in making a better game yet.

If this is going to be a long discussion, then maybe we should make our own thread?