Ballinderry board.

Summary on the Irish Brandubh.

To that comes that the board can contain a throne square or not. The game with a throne will be called Brandubh, and the game with no throne will be called "Brandubh throneless".

This makes in all 6 possible initial setups for the Brandubh 7x7 game. In any case the Brandubh king is armed, is captured from two sides and wins in corner.

The game balances for the 6 setups were measured through test tournaments:

Board setup	Brandubh throneless	Brandubh (throne)
cross	-2.75	+1.75
circle	-2.75	+1.62
line	-1.95	+2.19

The measured game balances confirm, that a throne square protects the king and is a help to the defenders.

The best balanced setup was found to be Brandubh cross.

As for historical evidence, the Ballinderry board has marked corner squares and a marked throne. Our test games show that the Brandubh cross setup fits this board.

More about the Irish Brandubh in our forum.
Test tournament.