Yeah I've felt the same way at times, especially when the armor/weapon types make it very rock paper scissors. It wasn't as blatant in the original StarCraft, but WarCraft 3 and StarCraft 2 seemed to go hard into counters against certain types of units, so someone who either scouts a bit better than you do or picks an army composition that happens to perfectly counter yours will mop the floor with you.

My partner and I had way more fun in those early games when we could stretch it out to 30-60 minutes sometimes. Once you're playing against ranked people who are there to win it's just a mad rush to the first or second tech tier.