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Tactics.



Surprising as it may seem, you need to think about some crude kind of tactics to beat the 1/1 odds on a number of games. The reason why is that each time a ship is sunk, all the adjoining squares get a known, forbidden, state. So the remaining number of unknown squares shrinks with each success. The lower you can get the number of forbidden squares, the harder the job for the challenger.

The ' packed ' tactic

Grouping the boats the most that you can appears as the obvious way to keep the forbidden squares number low. The forbidden areas of each boats overlap. A player choosing randomly a square has a larger chance to hit an empty one. The winning trick ? Not so sure. Your challenger can suspect you of using the ' packed ' tactic. He will systematically hit the playable squares immediately next to a forbidden one. All your boats will be quickly disposed of. Trafalgar French side.

The ' marginal ' tactic

Another playing way,in the same view, is to stick all boats to the sides of the grid. Plenty of room in the middle for the stupid random player to drown it's shells into. But if the challenger is no stupid random player... Trafalgar again.

The ' even ' tactic

Complementary of the two others. You scatter your boats evenly on the grid, the challenger can only rely on luck to hit the good square. On the other hand, each boat returns more forbidden squares, on average, and gives a big push toward victory

So what ? One must go a bit further to get a better chance. Lets have look to strategies.