Dominate

Dominate is a two-player game of area domination with deceptively simple rules. The game is played on a square 9 x 9 game board with 3 x 3 sub-regions enclosed in boxes – a Sudoku grid without numbers. For game purposes, the board can be broken down into 27 overlapping regions each containing nine squares. There are nine rows, nine columns and nine 3x3 boxes. The board is empty at the start of the game. Players take turns placing one, two or three stones as an orthogonally connected group on empty squares. Swap rules apply. Players may not pass a turn. A player dominates a region by occupying any 5 or more squares in the region. The game is won by dominating 14 or more regions on the board.