looking for the good strat city building games like c@c and warcraft 3
that does not have whole lot of random buttons and bars

and not civ games or tropical

Look into the Spellforce series. RPG/RTS hybrid just like warcraft, with good lore behind it ;)

Spellforce... Similar in principle, but I never thought of it as having that much in common with Warcraft III .

The closest I can think of are the Warlords:Battlecry games.

Battle Realms is the closest Warcraft-like game that comes to mind.

Armies of Exigo is inspired by Warcraft III a lot. Too much in my opinion. I played it soon after W3 and it felt like attempt to copy almost all mechanisms of it with worse result.
I disliked it because it was too similar and I played it soon after W3 and because there were some bad gameplay decisions but it matches your criteria.
Unfortunately I am not sure you can get it legally anywhere.

Well... How about StarCraft II?

Rise of Nations, Age of Mythology.

Warlords Battlecry 3?