The game Yubotu is a modified form
of the classic game Battleship mixed with a little Sudoku that
is played solo.
This cache is based on the "Seaman" level, or
Easy level. The Admiral level is the most difficult.
The Rules of Yubotu apply to all difficulty levels. I will
only present the Rules for this cache. If/when I get other
levels up, please refer back to this page for the rules.
Jump past the Rules if you know what to do to
start the puzzle. Please note the additional Rules for
adapting this for geocaching.
And a picture of Capt PQGT driving a real LA
Class submarine, the USS Santa Fe, in 1999. That was an
experience and the Navy will never be the same...
THE RULES
Object of the Puzzle:
In order to successfully complete the
puzzle, you need to place all the ships in the fleet in their
correct positions in the grid.
A ten ship fleet consists of four ship
classifications. There
is one battleship (four squares in length), two cruisers (three
squares in length), three destroyers (two squares in length) and
four submarines (one square each). This fleet is placed in a 10x10
grid.
The ships are placed either horizontally
or vertically in the grid but no two ships may occupy adjacent grid
squares. All other squares must be occupied by water.
Do not place
ships diagonally.
Each ship is completely surrounded by water or against an
edge. No ship
segment will be adjacent to another ship.
At the start of a new puzzle, you are
given one or more squares already filled in. These may be ship
segments or water. All the other squares are "unknown".
To help you solve the puzzle, you are
also shown the number of ship segments contained in each row and
column (numbers down the
right and the bottom sides of the grid). Use these numbers to
help determine where the boats are placed. Example: A row or column that has
a 4 on the right/bottom would contain 4 ship segments (complete or
partial). A row/column
that has a 0 would only contain water and no ship
segments. Any space
that you know does not contain a ship segment, insert a water
symbol (squiggly lines) in that square. If you are not sure, leave it
blank and fill in later.
There are three basic solving
strategies:
1. Fill in what you know in squares adjacent
to given ship segments.
2. Fill in water in rows and columns that have
all of the ship segments already in place.
3. Fill in ship segments in rows and columns
that must have all of their remaining spaces filled in order to
equal the corresponding number along the side/bottom of the
grid.
There are more Advanced Techniques for
harder puzzles available on the web.
An online version can be found online
(in case you get hooked on the game):
The geocaching additional
features:
To make this work for Geocaching, I’ve
introduced additional features, but the game play is the
same. To derive
the numbers, once you have figured out the position of the
ships/subs you then work across the Rows, left to right,
starting from the top. The first row that has the
forward part of a ship is counted as the first
number. Only
count the ship’s bow, not the midsection or stern (except for
subs which are considered all bow since they only take up one
square. There may
be one or two coordinate numbers associated per ship and may
read across or down. Use both numbers within the
ship before counting the next numbers (see example
below). The next
row that has the forward part of a different ship would be
the next sequential number. If there are two ships that
start in the same row, count the first one then the second
one, left to right, then go to the next row. It’s up to you to determine
the right order.
See example below:
Good
luck. And I hope you
have “Fair Winds and Following Seas ”.
END
RULES
[Start
Puzzle:]
[End
Puzzle]
You are looking for
a cammoed PB jar, big enough for small things like little boats,
geocoins, etc.
You can check your answers for this puzzle on
Geochecker.com.