Games to play with slow friends?

I really like incremental timer. In Scrabble we set it to 1 minute per turn, but if you make a move earlier, the remaining time is added to the next turn. This way time is another resource that you may strategically balance. Like sometimes it's better to do a good enough move instead of the perfect one, just so you have more time later if needed.

Timers are great for players who know a game well and already play fast. But in most cases they just make slower players feel punished without actually speeding them up.

I have tried them with some willing and self aware AP players and even then it has never worked to encourage them to play faster beyond the first few turns. Not once.

Strict timers are more likely to make a slow player anxious and even slower to the point of failing at finishing their turn in time. Then you will have to deal with a player who just loses and is frustrated with this special house rule that is essentially targeting them.

A passive timer that tracks how long each player is taking (e.g. BGA online games) can be helpful in informing players at the end of the game when they don't realize or refuse to believe they are slow, but anything that cuts a player off or penalizes them really isn't fun for anyone at the table irl.