Bomb dropping algorithm

Question

I have an n x m matrix consisting of non-negative integers. For example:

2 3 4 7 1
1 5 2 6 2
4 3 4 2 1
2 1 2 4 1
3 1 3 4 1
2 1 4 3 2
6 9 1 6 4
         


        

Answer 1

You could use state space planning. For example, using A* (or one of its variants) coupled with an heuristic f = g + h like this:

• g: number of bombs dropped so far
• h: sum over all values of the grid divided by 9 (which is the best result, meaning we have an admissible heuristics)