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>That means it's still possible to win a game by intentionally deviating from the perfect sequence

This part is not correct. If the arbitrary board state you start from is reachable from the fixed opening state given that the other player plays perfectly, then weak-solvedness means the other player can force whatever (a draw, in this case). If not, then the question is open. I don't know Othello, but an example of a chess position that is not reachable from the standard opening position is one where White has 8 pawns (so none have been promoted) but two bishops on white squares -- such a position can never arise through a legal sequence of moves. If we pretend for a moment that chess has been weakly solved as a draw, another example would be a position where White has only its king left, while Black has two rooks -- in this situation, Black can force a win, which implies that this is not a position that could ever arise under perfect play from the standard opening position, since that has already been proven to always result in a draw.

I found it helpful to (re-)derive what "forcing a draw" actually means, maybe you will too: Player 1 can force a draw from board position B in k moves or less iff, on their turn, (1) it is already a draw or a win for them, or (2) k >= 1 and they can play a move that draws or wins immediately, or (3, the inductive case) k >= 2 and they can play a move such that, for every legal move that player 2 could then play, player 1 can force a draw or win from the resulting board position in k-2 moves or less.



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