Game Engine: Unity

Develompent time: 5 months.

Skill level: Basic coding knowledge, basic knowledge on unity.

Team size: 3. Me as designer and coder, and two others in charge of art and sound.

Okay so currently I am taking a class on game design. (That is why such a short time span) still I have a lot of free time and since I am studying in college I am not leaving work or have a economic problem. My dilema is to wether or not use a 3D engine. I am following a couple of tutorials on youtube for developing an RTS that I am planning on using as a basic model en build my own game from there. 

The style that I am looking for its pretty much that of classic RTS games as in Age of Empires, or the not so recent games of Warcraft asn Starcraft. Part of the mechanics of the game that I would like should involve different levels of altitude in the terrain. 

Taking in consideration the Engine that I will be using and my skill I am pretty much decided for a 2D looking game with isometric Art with 8 different orientations so both structures and units can be rotated. 

I looked up on the internet but I am not entirely sure of wether or not should this type of games are coded in a 2D or 3D setting on the engine. Probably it can be made in both ways but here I come to ask you for the most easy, introductory way to design such a game. And Thank you all for the help.!

43 minutes ago, Francowboy said:

My dilema is to wether or not use a 3D engine.

This isn't a Game Design question, so this thread is moving to a more appropriate forum.

43 minutes ago, Francowboy said:

I come to ask you for the most easy, introductory way to design such a game.

You're not asking about design. You're asking about engines.

Most of the game is a simulation, moving things, and AI planning if you want a computer opponent. None of it is bound to the number of dimensions (well, movement is a bit) so either number of dimensions is fine. As likely almost everything is stuck to the ground, 3d doesn't do much in game play, so 3D is only for better looks.

RTS is a difficult game type, as there is lots of concurrency going on. I'd say make your life as simple as you can, drop the 3rd dimension.

If you're making a 2D game in Unity, you code it in the 2D setting.  For "introductory way to design such a game," my advice is to start with just a harvesting unit, a building unit, and a combat unit (along with associated buildings).  Don't make it more complicated until you have an enjoyable gameplay loop.

One a side note, I had made a click-to-move tutorial for 2D unit movement in Unity because I couldn't find one.  If you need to know how to do it, you can find some good code in its comments section (mine is kind of functional)

Thanks for the advices. Since most of the tutorials on RTS that I could find are based on 3Ds settings that is what I am gonna go for. But as @Lendrigan Games suggested we will be building the project from the most basic structures and mechanics required for this type of games to the more complex ones. This as you can imagine so than on every stage we can ensure a stable and testable game.