To throw a wrinkle into that, the joke was lost on me, despite being someone who logged several hundred (if not thousand) hours into the original Starcraft between 1998-2003 or so.
However, the distinction is my idea of "online play" back in the day was either playing with friends whom I knew personally, or playing an "All vs Comp" match where several human players would play against a single computer component. And we'd still lose about half the time.
But point being, I never really played PvP, and I don't think that term "counter" came from the original Starcraft manual or strategy guides. It was a term that evolved into the meta community. And if you weren't sufficiently plugged into that community, you wouldn't encounter the term.
There's probably tons of other examples of this, e.g. in the fighting game community.
Yeah, it's definitely in the sliver of the venn diagram where Starcraft and competitive gaming overlaps.
Here is another Starcraft joke you may appreciate:
> A dragoon walks into a bar. No, not around to the bar. A dragoon walks next to the entrance of a bar. A dragoon takes a step toward the bar. A dragoon walks into a bar. Nooo! Not that way!
I suppose the assumption is that the path is calculated based on a constant (I assume either average or current) speed, when in reality the speed varies?
I have a similar experience with Age of Empires 2. I played it a lot as a kid and only recently realised there's a pretty active multiplayer community with a few popular streamers like T90 on YouTube commentating on matches. They have a lot of custom lingo, so you'll hear something like "looks like he's going for fast imp" (meaning the commentator thinks a player is following a strategy whereby they prioritise advancing their civilization to the Imperial Age).
Wait, that game is still around!? I played it so much as a kid. I actually logged a lot in the original AOE. That is fantastic and a testament to what is lost with modern games requiring a server to be continually provided.
I find the "nothing" maps like that to be quite entertaining, but there are a number of good ones out there, and there's plenty of creative strategies and personalities. My favourite was a player called "WALL" who ... well maybe easier if I show you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5ecZEs2Y0o
Marines are the basic unit of Terran. Terran will build marines throughout the game (unless they go mech, but bio is the primary composition for all matchups). With upgrades marines have high dps & speed. They're a small unit which means you can fit more dps within a small area. They're ranged, unlike zerglings & zealots. Terran's drop ship, medivacs, can ferry around 8 marines while healing them on the ground
In reality the counter to them is splash damage, though good micro can mitigate that somewhat, & Terran isn't going to stop building marines just because the opponent built some splash damage
In some regards this can be rooted in people expecting StarCraft to be like Age of Empires, where as you climb the tech tree you discard previous tech. StarCraft instead prefers tech to fill out a composition & late tech often provides a support role to earlier tech
In the game of Rock, Paper, Scissors, each choice has a counter choice that thoroughly defeats it. If you knew that your opponent was going to reveal a scissors, you would counter with a rock.
In Star Craft, each unit has opposing units that are extra effective against it, so if your opponent had a bunch of marines, you might build a bunch of siege tanks.
You pretty much get balance whine in any competitive game. Sometimes the communities mature out of it, but the scrub mentality comes very natural to a lot of people.
I think it's a funny joke, though. Even though, when I've played Stacraft, I've been the one making marines.
> A marine walks into a bar. He looks around and is confused, says "where is the counter?".
I wonder if, in 3000 years, they'll be trying to figure that one out as well.