Disappointed ...

I am very curious about Farwest comments though.  Can anyone name ANY Realtime Strategy game ever, that does not have you "reinvent the wheel" on each map? 
...
I just cannot think of a single relatively popular such game without such a mechanic.

It seems you haven't played Strategy games much and you confuse this genre as RTS only. This game has a Grand Strategy Map with nodes (sectors) each proving RTS scenes seperately. This is 4X game at the moment. Have you ever played any Totalwar game? Probably you haven't, it is a famous example, just check please. In that game series, you have a large Strategy Map (like we have in Sector Siege), you research your tech, then when you enter any battle, you fight with the tech you developed. You don't reinvent the wheel. 
For instance if you play Empire Totalwar, let's say when you research your flintlock muskets tech in turn 50, in battles after turn 50, you can start to recruit better muskeeters with their new guns. 

Another example? Cool. Any 4X game (especially with seperate battles in seperate scenes to give you exact answer). Endless Space? Stellaris? Galactic Civilizations?
More titles outside Space-theme? Cool. Endless Legend, any Civilization or XCOM series, etc. In all these games, you develop your Starship or Soldiers or Fantasy units by researching tech in Campaign Map, then you start to recruit new units with those tech. 

Probably you haven't played none of these famous titles, but stuck to good-old C&C only maybe. It is good, this is your first 4X title, if you liked 4X, there are plenty more for you to try now.

In summary, this is not niche and I can name you countless games, where you research something and progress with those research in future battles throughout the campaign without reinventing the wheel.

Heck, I agreed with 6 out of 7 of his points.  I guess he is a very important Marketing Exec and isn't used to anyone disagreeing. :-)

I don't need to agree on your points which I already mentioned. It would be silly double confirming myself. And I am free to not agree with almost none of your comments over my comments.

Alright let's mind our own business and focus to thread instead of discussing small subjects. If we respect to each other and other opinions since the beginning, we don't discuss all these.