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Using a sand hourglass timer for board games

I first ran into hourglass timing in the baduk community.

One problem has been that to set up the timers, you need to take pretty much half of the total time. So with a 5 minute glass, it takes 2½ minute to reset it.

Today I came up with this variant:

Start the game with the hourglass placed between the players with the bulb that has the most sand on top. There can be any sand ratio, it doesn’t have to be in the middle nor all in one end. Any ratio is fine.

From then on, one player can at any time claim the currently lower bulb to belong to them.

Then at the end of a turn, flip the timer over, so that your bulb is on top during your turn. If your bulb runs out of sand, you lose.

There can only be one claim made per game. So there are gonna be a couple of turns where the hour glass doesn’t belong to anyone and the sand just runs in one direction. Then after the claim is when you start flipping it back and forth.

To make the claim on your opponents turn, move the timer over to their side without flipping it. To make the claim on your turn, move the timer over to your side and flip it.

If, at the start of the game, you can’t agree on which side has the most sand, just have each player claim the bulb that they think has the least, right from the start of the game.

Aaaand the word “bulb” now sounds weird to me. Thanks, English…

Hourglass Timing at Sensei’s Library