BattleSnake 2015

presented by sendwithus, powered by Heroku

BattleSnake is a RESTful AI competition held in Victoria BC.

Teams from local schools and tech companies write AI clients for the game BattleSnake.

Last snake standing wins, prizes will be awarded to the most successful teams.

API details and documentation will be released and discussed the morning of the event.

For more information or to register a team, visit battlesnake.io.

Questions? Email battlesnake@sendwithus.com.

Table of Contents

• Location and Schedule
• Preparing for Battle
• Prizes and Awards
• Game Rules
• Snake API Documentation
• Example Snakes
• Testing Snakes

BattleSnake is Sponsored By

• Heroku
• sendwithus
• Dropbox
• VIATeC
• OneNet Marketing
• University of Victoria, Department of Computer Science
• University of Victoria, Technology Integrated Learning
• Women in Engineering and Computer Science (WECS)
• UVic Computer Science Course Union (CSCU)
• UVic Web Development Club

Location and Schedule

When
February 21st, 11:00am - 8:00pm

Where
University of Victoria, ECS 123 (map)

Schedule

Time	Event
11:00am	Team Registation
11:30am	Orientation and Game Rules
12:00pm	Hacking Begins!
12:30pm	Food
5:30pm	More Food!
6:00pm	BattleSnake Tournament Starts
7:30pm	Drinks @ Felicita's

Preparing for Battle

Everything you need to know before attending BattleSnake.

Come Prepared

Your team will be writing code, come prepared to do so. You should also have the following ready

• Laptop with the following setup:
  • Git
  • Programming language of choice (Node, Python, Java, etc)
  • A text editor (Sublime Text, Vim, etc)
• A GitHub account
• A free Heroku account

Learning Heroku

For novice and intermediate programmers, we strongly recommend familiarizing yourself with Heroku before hand. Deploying with Heroku will maximize time spent developing your AI (and not messing around with servers). All provided code samples and example AIs will be ready-to-deploy to Heroku.

Also see

• Getting Started on Heroku
• Heroku Toolbelt
• Deploying to Heroku with Git
• Deploying to Heroku with Dropbox

Registration

Team registration opens at 11:00am in ECS 123.

To register, you'll need the following:

• Team/Snake Name
• Name of all team members (1-4 suggested)

Individuals may register and compete as a one person team. Anyone looking to join a team will be accommodated.

Orientation

Orientation will start promptly at 11:30am. Do not be late.

Topics covered during orientaion

• Tournament format and schedule
• Game rules and API documentation
• Sample code for Python, Node, Java, Ruby, and Go
• Where to find help

Orientation will also be the best time to ask questions. Hacking will start immediately afterwards.

Prizes and Awards

Grand Prize
$500, BattleSnake Swag Pack

Second Place
$300, BattleSnake Swag Pack

Third Place
$200, BattleSnake Swag Pack

Heroku Award
Heroku Longboard

Dropbox Award
1TB Dropbox Space (each)

Awards (BattleSnake Swag Pack)

• Hungriest Snake (most food eaten)
• Killer Instinct Snake (most kills)
• Elder Snake (longest)

Game Rules

To be announced.

Snake API Documentation

To be announced.

Example Snakes

The sendwithus team has provided basic Snake AIs to get you started. Each of these clients can be deployed to Heroku without additional configuration.

Starter Snakes

• NodeJS
• Python
• Java
• Ruby
• Go
• [Clojure] (https://github.com/sendwithus/battlesnake-clojure)

Example Snakes (that suck)

• FILL THIS IN

Testing Snakes

• Mention ngrok.
• Mention debug mode.
• Mention papertrail.

Questions?

Email battlesnake@sendwithus.com.

For more information or to register a team, visit battlesnake.io.