sorry for double post, forgot to mention Knights of Honor. Another old RTS game but its more of a grand strategy game set in the middle ages. Think total war but in 2D. There is a grand map of Europe, many many factions to play as, battles play out in real time, manage an empire, etc. 

sounds like you'd like a game called Kohan 2. It's a fantasy RTS available on Steam. There are many factions ranging from humans, to elves, to undead, to demons, and even beast-like races. It's an older game so it's 2D but still fun. One of the drawbacks is that you can't build a base with the same freedom you have in BFME 2. Think how the bases were like in BFME 1

Another fantasy RTS is a game called Heroes of Annihilated Empires. Its similar to Kohan in that there are many races to play and battles can be huge and epic.  However, the game doesn't seem very balanced, theres some bugs, and I haven't found out how to get it to work on Windows 7

mount and blade warband

theres an article on this herehttp://www.gamespot.com/news/major-layoffs-at-wild-man-dev-6402672

Chris says he still has a fully functioning company, though its smaller now. The part I don't get in the article is Chris asking supporters if he should continue with the kickstarter project or terminate it. If the kickstarter doesn't make it wont all the money be refunded anyway? Thought thats how it worked

Chris also mentions that the future of GPG rests on the success of Wildman. I hope it makes it.

glad to see some Men of War fans in here. I would also go with MoW over the other games. CoH is still great though. Anyway, CoH and WiC are similar because I think they both have the mechanic of capturing and holding territory on the battlefield. CoH has multiple resources like fuel and ammo in order to create units but in WiC you only purchase reinforcements with money and those units can be deployed anywhere. WiC is probably the easiest to get into but if your looking for something more tactical I'd say go with CoH or MoW

we have some amazing strategy titles coming like CoH2 and Rome 2: Total War. There are also some lesser known titles that came out not too long ago. Most notable is Wargame European Escalation. Wargame has an expansion in the making. Men of War Assault Squad is also one of my favorites, and there is a kickstarter porject for a spiritual successor to the Men of War games called Call to Arms. This time it's not WWII but modern combat. Someone also mentioned Planetary Annihilation. And i'm hoping for a Dawn of War 3.

So, there is actaully a lot to be excited about for strategy fans.

i was in the same boat as you Ammo, and I also chose the GTX 660. I'm upgrading from a GTX 260

i was avoiding metro 2033 for a similar reason. I'm such a chicken. Same reason why I avoided the STALKER series for so long. But then I played and fell in love with STALKER... but I still wouldn't play it at certain times of day :P

sc2 has the same old gameplay from 1998. I did enjot WC3 much more.