Freezers

Freezers is a paper and pencil game that can be played on a small piece of paper at the pub or cafe. Players alternate claiming (placing a stone of their colour on) an empty square of a square grid; no passing. If you have no legal placements, you lose. A group touching any strictly larger enemy group, or lacking an empty adjacent space, is said to be 'frozen'. To 'grow' is to claim an empty square orthogonally adjacent to a friendly group. If you can claim a square with no orthogonal neighbours, you must. After such squares are depleted, it is time to grow. If all your groups are the same size, you can grow any unfrozen group. Otherwise, grow an unfrozen group without growing your largest groups (unless only your largest groups remain unfrozen). Touching (and thus freezing) your or enemy groups is allowed; only the starting group must be unfrozen. —description from the designer