Battleship is ranked very high on my most frustrating game list. I am the kind of person who needs to know everything and when something is hidden from me I tend to get annoyed. The hardest thing is finding that first ship. One you find the first one it gets easier.
I have noticed some strategies that people use in this game. The first is clumping the ships close together. This has its advantages and disadvantages. It is an advantage because they are less likely to guess where the ships are because of the compactness. But, once your opponent gets one of the ships they have a high chance of getting all of the surrounding ones as well. The other strategy is to spread them as far away apart as can be, on the borders. This I find works well but the borders are guessed quite frequently as locations for ships so watch out. I like to just randomly toss them on the board, no strategies for me.
I find battleship kind of a boring game though. If you think about it all you really do is guess a letter and a number until you finally find a ship and then you just continue to guess a letter and a number. I am into more interactive games. When have you ever seen someone laugh during a game of battleship? The only time I have is when whole tray gets knocked over and all the little pins go all over. I guess this game could be balls of fun for the serious and strategic type of players. But laughing is a sign that I am having fun so most likely battleship would not be my first pick.
