Ludo online

Goal

Get all 4 pawns from your base around the board into the middle. Whoever is left last loses.

Who starts

The game picks who starts. Then the turns follow the colours, skipping players who are already done.

Roll and move

Roll the die and move one pawn that many squares. If you can move, you must. When only one pawn can move, it moves by itself after a moment. Pawns jump over each other.

Six

On a six, put a pawn from your base on your start square, or move another pawn. You pick the pawn yourself and only then roll again. A third six in a row is lost: you don’t move and your turn ends. A six you can’t move with is lost too, and you don’t roll again. Whenever none of your pawns is out (all in the base or in the middle), you get 3 tries for a six.

Extra roll

You also roll again after capturing an opponent, after a pawn reaches the middle and, in Power, after a pawn stops on a +1 square. Several reasons give only one extra roll.

Safe squares

Nobody gets captured on start squares and stars, and anyone may stand there.

Capturing

When you land on a square, your pawns there are counted (in Pairs with your partner’s). Every opponent who has no more pawns there loses them all back home. With fewer pawns you can still land there, but nobody goes home.

Exact finish

Pawns reach the middle through their own home lane and only with an exact roll. A pawn the roll would carry past the middle can’t move.

Pairs

Four play; partners have opposite colours. A pair’s pawns count together and don’t capture each other. Whoever finishes moves their partner’s pawns. The pair with all eight pawns in the middle wins. Played only if the host picks the Pairs mode.

Power

Bonuses lie on the board. A pawn that ends its move on one adds it to the stock of the player who moved, even with a partner’s pawn, at most 3 of each kind. Passing over isn’t enough. Picked-up bonuses come back when the next turn starts. Only if the host turns it on.

Bonuses

You may use at most one bonus from your stock per roll: Double roll and Dice control before it, the Shield before or after it. The others can’t see your stock.

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  Double roll – Switch it on before rolling and the pawn moves double: a six makes 12. It isn’t a six: it brings no pawn out and gives no extra roll for a six (a capture or reaching the middle still does).

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  Dice control – Before rolling, pick the number from 1 to 6 that comes up. A chosen six counts as a normal six.

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  Shield – Give it to one of the pawns you move, on the track. Nobody can send it home until your next turn (bonus rolls don’t count), and it can still capture. It still counts when the pawns on a square are compared.

• +1

  Extra roll – The +1 square isn’t stored: a pawn that ends its move on it rolls again right away.

Turn time

You have 30 seconds to roll and move, otherwise a bot plays for you. After two missed turns the bot keeps playing until you tap the die at the start of your turn.

Leaving and bots

Whoever leaves the game gets a bot in their seat. They can come back while the game runs; otherwise they lose. If you lose the connection, a bot plays for you until you are back.