<< the game is inferior to starcraft >>
I was never impressed with starcraft. It was the SOS to me.
War3 is beta. A lot of functionality is not yet in the game including balancing issues.
I've lost more games than won because it takes a long time to get good at this. I lost 6 games in a row until i started learning some decent strategies. I always open up two barracks to start now and level up as soon as possible. Sadly concentrating on this I've taken to forgetting to expand early the last several games, but most of the games I play are short so it's ok. I love 3v3.
In regards to the elvish rush two words: Defended footmen.
Patch 1.10 will be out shortly and will rebalance some things including taking away the ground attack of gargoyles, making defend not work on huntresses, using orc burrows as farms, toning down water elementals, etc.