Return to Verdun - first game with Bello Ludi WW1 rules

[James Morris]

After a gap of a couple of years, I got the urge to get the First World War collection out for another game. This was partially because Scrivs was back in the country with his substantial collection of minis that we’d used for our Verdun campaigns back in 2015-16, and partially because I’d liked the sound of the Bello Ludi rules after catching a post about them on Instagram. After a bit more research I decided to take a punt on the rules and bought them from Caliver Books along with a set of cards and a couple of the game-specific command dice.


Bello Ludi are a Dutch publisher that has created a core set of rules based around the command dice and cards – which are transferable across the various BL games. A large part of their business is using wargaming as a team-building activity, often for non-wargamers, so the rules are designed to be simple and easy to pick up.

I was surprised how slim the Bello Ludi WW1 rulebook was – just 24 sides of A5. It contains all the core rules with some additional rules for flamethrowers, tanks, planes and so on. There are no force or platoon organisations – I would have appreciated even just a couple of sample platoons for the Western Front as an example of where to get started. As an experienced gamer, it wasn’t too hard to put together some French and German lists of my own for our first game, but I did feel that a newer player might have been put off by this. (Stats for different nations’ artillery and vehicles are available on the BL website).

One of the big attractions of Bello Ludi was the fact that the game has been designed for multiple players a side, each controlling a ‘group’ of units, without the complexity of some rules systems. I put together a scenario loosely based on the struggles for the village of Fleury-devant-Douamont during the battle of Verdun: two French machine-gun teams were holed out on the outskirts of Fleury but the Germans were mounting an attack with three platoons supported by flamethrowers to drive them out. The French HMG teams had a pair of platoons in reserve but would be outnumbered by the Germans.

The game was fast-moving and good fun. although we made some tweaks to the rules after a couple of hours of play. 

I haven't really got the space here for a full write up (you can find that on my blog here https://mogsymakes.net/2022/07/13/return-to-verdun-bello-ludi-ww1/with many more pics)

[Driscoles]

Thanks for the report and a glimpse into the rules.

[fred]

Thanks for the write-up of the game and the rules. Great looking figures - and good to see someone else going with a brown mud table for mid/late WWI

Other than the speed of play where there other bits of the rules that where good? You reference Lardy rules, so I assume yo have used Through the Mud and Blood previously?

[James Morris]

Thanks for the write-up of the game and the rules. Great looking figures - and good to see someone else going with a brown mud table for mid/late WWI

Other than the speed of play where there other bits of the rules that where good? You reference Lardy rules, so I assume yo have used Through the Mud and Blood previously?

No problem. The mat was made using caulk and linen fabric by Scrivs some years back.

I own Mud and Blood but never played it, going straight on to the WW1 Chain of Command variant.  I think other advantages of Bello Ludi are:
1) ability to handle multiple platoons and players very easily
2) the cards add an extra layer of detail
3) commander dice system is fun and gives some friction and unpredictability
4) prisoners are taken during close combats and have to be escorted to the rear (though this didn’t happen in our game)

[Golgotha]

Cracking looking game do like your blog too and thank you for the review of a set of rules I was not familiar with and may prove just the ticket for some WWI games. 

I see they do loads of possible periods for these rules https://www.belloludi.nl/belloludi-rules-system

[fred]

Thanks James - some intersting extra features of the rules.

We enjoyed games of CoC (WWII) a while ago, but they certainly aren’t light weight games and are very much 2 player games, so I can see the appeal of something lighter weight that allows for more players

[James Morris]

Thanks James - some intersting extra features of the rules.

We enjoyed games of CoC (WWII) a while ago, but they certainly aren’t light weight games and are very much 2 player games, so I can see the appeal of something lighter weight that allows for more players

Cheers Fred!  One of my holy grails of gaming is fast playing rules that can cope with multiple players.  I know that you can play big CoC by giving multiple platoons out, but in my experience it doesn't fit into a regular club night time frame. 

[Tom Dulski]

That flamethrower team looks great.