Glass Bead

Glass Bead is a territory game for two players: Red and Blue. It is played on the spaces of an initially empty square board. Recommended sizes are between 7x7 and 10x10 spaces. Each player must have access to a sufficient number of stones of their own color. An empty space is controlled by the player with more stones adjacent to it. Diagonal adjacencies also count. A space occupied by a stone is controlled by the owner of that stone. Red plays first, then turns alternate. On your turn, you must place a stone of your color on a empty space that is not controlled by either player. The game ends when no more placements are possible. The player who controls more spaces in the final position wins. According to the designer, this game, later reworked into Kuzushi, suffers from a huge first-player advantage. It is suggested to use komi (compensation points for the second player) to solve this issue.