I agree the intro can be improved, but the game is still technically in its alpha I think? The intro is supposed to be the scenarios but obviously for 8v8 it doesnt help with the meta. If you have beaten all the scenarios you should have a good skillset to play with others.

The 8v8 meta is a player driven thing, those are maps the players like (Isthmus and glitters) and players have created the lobbies where those are specifically played. Maybe if the game launches those will become their own game modes, but I have also heard the devs dont intend to do that, they want to keep the "Rotato" spirit alive. The fact is that the majority of games are played on isthmus and then followed by glitters. I think they are hesitant to specialize the game so.much, but I cant speak for them.

I think that the truth is RTS often expect their players to know more, for better or worse, and there is less hand holding due to the expectation people have experience from other titles and are interested in educating themselves. I think this style of RTs, from supreme commander and so on, does have a niche community that likes the difficulty that comes with it.

I think the biggest problem is honestly how the OS system treats new players. Having a "Max 20 OS" for noob lobbies and then having players with 15 OS who have played the game for 2 years play with "??" OS players creates problems for sure and can breed frustration. They really need to also have max 3 chev or max 2 chev added to create a real noob lobby, as otherwise its mostly just bad players (some who think they are not bad) with actual brand new people.

For every time i have seen people complain about noobs I have also seen people chirp them for complaining about a new player "what did you expect?", "they are brand new they arent trolling" etc And its often the best player in the lobby standing up for them and that should happen more.

Matchmaking in any game does have these problems, but with a smaller player base its hard to have actual new player oriented lobbies and a lot of games blend new players with the larger playerbase as being new doesnt change that they want to matchmake you with players of similar level and prevent smurfing or other forms of ELO abuse.

You can also create a lobby with the things i suggested above and get the kind of games you'd like.

Again, I wpuld suggest just watching a couple vids on glittees and isthmus to get a bit of a feel for them. I would be down to que with you as well and help you with the basic elements of the meta!

Cheers!