16!

Copyright (c) ? Niek Neuwahl

This game is played on an empty 12x12 square board:

The board is seen as a 4x4 set of 3x3 areas where players drop the following 3x3 patterns:

TURN - On each turn, each player picks one remaining pattern and drops it on a 3x3 empty area. The pattern must match with any adjacent pattern already on board. Two patterns match if for each pair of adjacent cells, both are empty or both are occupied (see example below). Players may rotate patterns but cannot mirror them. The first pattern must be placed at one of the four central 3x3 areas.  GOAL - The player that stalemates the adversary wins the game.

 

An match/mismatch example The left marked pattern match the central pattern, every pair of adjacent cells are both empty or both occupied. The right marked pattern is a mismatch, for example f7 is occupied and g7 is empty.