Optimal strategy for 4-in-a-row on 5-by-5 board with random setup and a transfer

Question

Is the optimal strategy known for the following variant of 4-in-a-row where the first 2 moves are random and the 2nd player can once move a mark to any location.

• Win condition: 4-in-a-row.

• Board: 5x5.

• Setup:

  1. Player1 randomly place a mark on the board.
  2. Player2 randomly place a mark on the board, which can not be in the center.

• Play:

  1. After the first move by player 1, player 2 can move their piece.
  2. Next, the turns alternating like in a regular tic-tac-toe.

Two questions:

1. Is this game solved/solvable?
2. Does player 2 have a strategy that can guarantee a win for every random first move? If so, what is that strategy?

Answer 1

This game is Solvable due to Zermelo's theorem. I don't know if someone solved it. This game is actually a mix of 25 * 24 games (setups). Solving the game means to solve each setup (which is a game with no affect of chance) and find if it is a p1 win, p1 lose or a draw.

The notation of a m,n,k-game talks about m-by-n board and win by making k-in-a-row. If we put a side the random setup and the transfer, a (5,5,4) is a draw. However increasing the board by a single row to (6,5,4) makes it a first player win.

This variant is a (5,5,4) with random setup and a transfer action of p2. Because the vanilla (5,5,4) is very close to p1 win, I think most setups are either p1 win or p2 win (but not a draw).