I've made a python script for evaluating who wins in simple fights where player B has a long chain same length or 1 more than player A.

There is catchup or not, they have the same free cells each with some free cells in common.

After running it for some depth of free cells and cells in common up to 25, I looked at stats:

- player A wins 42.78% of games,

- player B wins 44.30% of games

- games are decided by second or third… chain length 12.92% of games.

There are nice patterns based on parity of cells in common and modulo 6.

Thanks for sharing the results, but what do you mean by player A? Does it refer to the first player or the one who has a short chain?

Yes both, as if both players have chains of same length then it is a win for player to play (A) (exception if there are just 5 free cells in common) , hence I gave the possibility for B to have a long-chain of length one more than A.

The pawns or structures existing in the free region is not taken into account.

5 free cells in common always allows B to win when they have same number of free cells and B long chain is one more than A.

Otherwise, if the number of free cells for each is equal and odd and greater than 1, B wins when the number of common free cells is 4 or 5.