counterplay

plural counterplays

1. countableuncountableA game move made as a response.
2. countableuncountableboard gamesA counterattack in a different part of the board.

   Milov might have tried 15 ... b4 to give himself some counterplay on the queenside.

   2007 January 7, Dylan Loeb Mcclain, “After a Detour, Nakamura, 19, Is Back to His Winning Ways”, in New York Times

3. countableuncountablehuman sciencesA subversive style of gameplay in which a player attempts to overturn the usual rules and conventions of the game.

   Near-synonym: playing off meta — colloquial

   Synonyms: playing off meta

present singular third person counterplays · participle present counterplaying · participle past counterplayed · past counterplayed

1. To make a counterplay; to play in response.

   I knew that, with this arrangement, unless I should counterplay, they would soon fleece me.

   1844, Jonathan H. Green, Gambling Unmasked! […], page 191

   2 more examples

   In these wars of theirs for the heritage of the whole world, continents will be staked, India, China, South Africa, Russia, Islam called out, new technics and tactics played and counterplayed.

   1928 [1922], Oswald Spengler, translated by Charles Francis Atkinson, The Decline of the West, volume 2, Perspectives of World-History, page 429

   Ironically, therefore, Deng shrewdly counterplayed his “American card” against the Soviet Union in order to forestall Soviet military retaliation against China for the invasion of their Vietnamese ally.

   1985, Francis Anthony Boyle, World Politics and International Law, →ISBN

2. To counter; to contrast or contradict.

   Self-reflections on hope are counterplayed by the grim reality in the camp, reminiscent of a lost home, and the agony for the future.

   2019, Natasha Remoundou, “Intercultural Performance Ecologies in the Making: Minor(ity) Theatre and the Greek Crisis”, in Charlotte McIvor, Jason King, editors, Interculturalism and Performance Now: New Directions?, →ISBN, page 296

   2 more examples

   Yürük weaving generally comprises a rich burnt apricot, particularly in the borders; a mulberry-red filling large areas of the field; lighter reds used to counterplay against a deep, dark crimson […]

   1997, Brian W. MacDonald, Tribal Rugs: Treasures of the Black Tent, page 60

   At 3:37, two simultaneous vocal tracks begin to counterplay each other in Bono’s struggle with the range of the pain he is channeling […]

   2021, Bradley Morgan, U2’s The Joshua Tree: Planting Roots in Mythic America, →ISBN, page 38