Ludo (board game)
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- This article is about the board game. For more meanings, see Ludo.
Ludo (from Latin ludus, "game") is a simple board game played mainly by children, in which each player must move their four tokens from their starting positions round the board to their final allocated position. The first to do so wins. The game is a simplification of the traditional Indian Cross and Circle game Pachisi. It originally appeared in 1896 (the game was patented in England, as patent 14636).
King_Ludo2.jpg
To make a move, a player rolls a single die. If the player rolls a six, the player can bring a new piece into play, provided the starting space is free, or choose to move a piece of theirs already in play six places around the board. After rolling a six, a player gets another turn. (Some house rules speed the game by letting a player bring out a piece on a roll of one if the player has no other pieces in play; in this case, the player does not get an extra turn.) If they roll any other number, they move one of their existing pieces the indicated number of spaces around the board, provided they have a piece out. Should all four pieces still be in the 'base', then the die must be passed to the next player. If a piece lands on a piece owned by another player, the other player's piece is removed from play and must begin its journey again. If a piece lands on the same space as the another piece of the same player's colour, then the moved piece must take the following space. If this subsequent space is occupied by a piece from any team, then the moved piece must return to its base.
In some variations of the rules, if they land on one of their own pieces, they form a "block" which cannot be passed by any opponent's pieces (other variations simply do not permit players to move pieces such that they land on top of their own pieces).
Once a piece has been around the board completely, it can enter the "home straight", a stretch of four spaces which no other pieces can enter (and is thus safe from capture). For a piece to complete its journey, a piece must travel up the home straight and land exactly on the one of the four spaces.
The minimum of strategy in the game makes it of primary interest to younger children, although the agony of choice when rolling a six over whether to bring out a new peice or push another further round requires skilful risk assesment, further complicated by the recurring roll of "the old 6, 1,"; an inexplicable phenomenon involving the probabilistically common throwing of a six followed by a one.
The more glamorous version of the game, 'King Ludo', benefits from exactly the same rules as above, the only difference being that the winner is (subsequent to their victory) crowned King Ludo, at which point they ecstatically proclaim "(I am) KING LUDO!". King Ludo's reign is only as long as the space of time between his victory and the conclusion of the next game, in which he may defend his throne or abstain honourably, the latter resulting in his automatic usurpation. The reigning King Ludo enjoys the benefits of being chief arbitrator in cases of dispute during the following game as well as in day to day trivialities between games.
Additional Resources
- Hasbro sells a Trouble brand ludo set ( http://www.boardgames.com/boardgames/poptroub.html ) and a more complicated variation called Sorry ( http://www.boardgames.com/boardgames/sorry.html ).da:Ludo