How to Play Battleship

Collect the ships you need to begin play. Each player receives 1 aircraft carrier, 1 destroyer, 1 battleship, 1 cruiser and 1 submarine.

Position your ships on the lower grid wherever you choose, but they must be positioned either horizontally or vertically, not diagonally. Once all ships have been placed, the game begins.

Choose who goes first in whatever manner works. Some players flip a coin, other players play "Rock, Paper, Scissors."

Make a guess as to where your opponent's ships are by declaring a grid coordinate as your "target." Coordinates are given in terms of a number and letter according to the the grid (J-10, for example, is the bottom right corner).

Inform your opponent of the outcome of his shots by declaring if it was a hit or a miss. If any part of your ship is located at the coordinates, then it was a hit. If you are hit, place a peg in the hit coordinate of the ship.

Keep track of the hits and misses on your opponent's grid by using the upper grid on your side of the board. Generally, the red pegs mark hits and the white pegs mark misses.

Continue hitting your opponent's ship until it is covered in pegs and destroyed. Ships that are completely damaged are sunk and removed from the board.

Continue play until one side has lost all of her ships. The other player is declared the winner.

Use variants to play the game differently. Declare a single target grid point a turn to make the game last longer or declare more target points at once. Some variants even see players playing on a grid that is over 20x20 (although there is no board this large, and these players use their own graph paper to do so).