Recently, since SC2 beta hit, I've been mulling about the idea of a "programmable RTS" -- an RTS that allows you to preprogram unit AI in some fashion, and then

Recently, since SC2 beta hit, I've been mulling about the idea of a "programmable RTS" -- an RTS that allows you to preprogram unit AI in some fashion, and then plays in such a way that your programming really factors into the game. For example, maybe you have many little units, so that it's difficult to micro them separately, or maybe the battles operate very quickly, or your units have an unusually large amount of active abilities. After all, most of your APM in a game like Starcraft is going toward things that you could replace with a very small shell script. Although I can't argue with success, it's always felt silly to me that a big part of the game is just building enough intuition and reflex so that you can actually spare your mind to think about the interesting parts. If you can simplify the reflexive pieces at "game-time" while keeping them interesting in a different way, that might leave you with a game that's even deeper strategically. However, it would be a difficult exercise to make an RTS that was dynamic enough that some folks with a lot of spare time didn't just write "ultimate" AI for all the units that is close-enough-to-perfect, and distribute that to all lazy players. Perhaps one might establish limitations on the resources or length of scripts you can write, so that it's difficult to write a script that is simultaneously effective for strategy A and different strategy B, and you need to specialize your code based on your style of play.