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BATTLESHIPS AS A DECISION PROBLEM
2004
ICGA Journal
We define the well-known puzzle of Battleships as a decision problem and prove it to be NPcomplete, by means of a parsimonious reduction. By applying Valiant and Vazirani's (1986) result we immediately obtain that the variant of this problem, viz. promising that there is a unique solution, is NP-complete as well, under randomized reductions. As this finding is in sheer contrast with the general experience of Battleship puzzles being well playable (i.e., effectively solvable), we arrive at a hypothetical explanation for this state of affairs.
doi:10.3233/icg-2004-27303
fatcat:ooziwp3e5rbktej736mgz2x6m4