NationStates issue results

[He Qixin]

https://www.nationstates.net/page=beta

I still think you should consider which one may affect the way stats change.

[Trotterdam]

http://www.nationstates.net/page=beta

I still think you should consider which one may affect the way stats change.

I am.

I'll deal with the betas once they get implemented. When that happens is not up to me. What more do you want me to do?

[He Qixin]

http://www.nationstates.net/page=beta

I still think you should consider which one may affect the way stats change.

I am.

I'll deal with the betas once they get implemented. When that happens is not up to me. What more do you want me to do?

alright, i didnt know

[Affairs]

A few days ago I realized something very important: these numbers aren't generated by answering issues blindly or randomly. They don't tell you the probable results for average nations. They tell you the probable results for nations that gave similar responses to other issues. This can lead to serious understatement of some effects. For example, an option that trashes your environment to benefit your economy is likely to be picked by nations that don't have much of an environment to trash anymore, and therefore its negative effect on environmental beauty will be under-reported.

[Candensia]

A few days ago I realized something very important: these numbers aren't generated by answering issues blindly or randomly. They don't tell you the probable results for average nations. They tell you the probable results for nations that gave similar responses to other issues. This can lead to serious understatement of some effects. For example, an option that trashes your environment to benefit your economy is likely to be picked by nations that don't have much of an environment to trash anymore, and therefore its negative effect on environmental beauty will be under-reported.

Correct, and Trotterdam has stated/indicated as much.

[Sapnu puas]

I've noticed that on issue results with a low plus mean number that it actually goes down no matter what issue.

Example: Issue #x has -20.38 to +22.14 (+1.whatever mean average) for an industry
I'd pick that option, and I'd go down anyway.

(While my nation is in the WA, the result still is evident in my puppet accounts.)

Sometimes, the result doesn't even get affected; are those types random when only "core" stats show up or something?

[Trotterdam]

A few days ago I realized something very important: these numbers aren't generated by answering issues blindly or randomly. They don't tell you the probable results for average nations. They tell you the probable results for nations that gave similar responses to other issues. This can lead to serious understatement of some effects. For example, an option that trashes your environment to benefit your economy is likely to be picked by nations that don't have much of an environment to trash anymore, and therefore its negative effect on environmental beauty will be under-reported.

True. It'll still probably be negative, though, even if it's less negative than it would be on another nation.

Furthermore, if even one nation answers an issue in a way that goes against the nation's previous policy (which is fairly likely to happen at some point, even if it's a minority) then this will update the minimum and maximum values, even if it doesn't do much for the mean.

Some fun statistics: currently, there are...
5.7% of effect/stat combinations always increase
4.5% of effect/stat combinations always decrease
9.4% of effect/stat combinations can increase or do nothing, but never decrease
11.3% of effect/stat combinations can decrease or do nothing, but never increase
40.5% of effect/stat combinations can either increase or decrease
28.6% of effect/stat combinations never do anything
This is counting only combinations with at least 2 data points.

I've noticed that on issue results with a low plus mean number that it actually goes down no matter what issue.

Obviously not. If there's a plus number, then a fair number of nations must have seen an increase.

Probably this means that your nation already has very high stats and so is more likely to go down.

Note that industry stats tend to be among the most finicky in the game anyway. If I cut them out, then the above statistics drop to only 26.9% effect/stat combinations being able to either increase or decrease from the same option. I would recommend putting little stock in industry/sector numbers unless they're described as never-decreasing/never-increasing, or the mean change has a large magnitude (triple digits, at least). For example, if you want to know how promoting or regulating the (non-modelled) furniture manufacturing industry affects the (modelled) furniture restoration industry stat in #512, then the numbers for that are pretty clear (quadruple-digit means and always in the same direction).

Given than industry stats need to reach quadruple or quintuple digits to indicate any significant quantity of that industry existing in your nation, a range of "-20.38 to +22.14" basically means that the option doesn't meaningfully affect this industry and any changes you may see are second-order side effects. I list all observed effects, but it's a good idea to exercise some of your own judgement in which look large enough to be significant.

[Minoa]

Hi, since the API implementation appears to capture the policies before the decision is enacted, it could be possible to look into the eligibility of issues, and whether they require a certain policy or more to be in force or not be in force at all.

As I explained to Jutsa two weeks ago:

Well, the problem is that it's hard to prove a negative.

For example, my database currently thinks that #861 requires the "Conscription" and "Parental Licensing" policies, simply because it's a rare issue and all four nations it's seen answering it so far had those policies, even though they're obviously irrelevant. My backed-up pre-reset database thought the same issue required the "Polygamy" policy, which is even more silly. Given enough data points, these should eventually disappear, but until then they look indistinguishable from the one reported policy requirement that does make sense, "Geronticide".

Checking for requiring a lack of a policy being required, rather than it presence, has the same problem even stronger, since some policies are just really rare. Currently, around half of the issues in the game have never been observed on a nation with the Child Self-Rearing policy. So telling whether any issues legitimately don't appear for nations with that policy is basically impossible.

So it takes some creative interpreting to figure out what's likely to be a real validity and what's just a coincidence.

Conversely, the simple act of banking an issue and answering it later, after your policies changed, can make it look like the issue doesn't have a validity when it does. This rarely happens, but given enough time it will eventually, and it basically invalidates any conclusions I can draw. I think option validities are immune to this, at least.

So in short, I have some tools that can help to confirm or refute a suspicion, but it's not practical to create an automated list. If you have any specific questions, ask.

Also, can you confirm #6.2’s policy changes? It feels as if that belongs to option 3.

If the effect line is correct, then the data is correct.

The issue option says: "For me, it's not about the name of your religion. It's about discovering your spirituality in whatever guise that takes.". Since this is promoting religious freedom rather than enforcing the precepts of any single religion, it is untheocratic.

Option 3 probably removes the Theocracy policy too, but that hasn't been captured yet because nations which are theocratic to begin with are unlikely to choose that option. I just queried the database and confirmed that, indeed, nobody has ever been observed doing that. (I do track the difference between "this has not been observed to happen" and "this has explicitly been observed to not happen", but displaying that in the published pages would be impractically bulky, especially since, as explained above, a lot of rarer policies will stay incomplete for a long time - and if an option has a policy prerequisite, then "what happens if someone without that policy chooses the option" will never be answerable.)

I’m sorry I slipped up.

[Trotterdam]

A few days ago I realized something very important: these numbers aren't generated by answering issues blindly or randomly. They don't tell you the probable results for average nations. They tell you the probable results for nations that gave similar responses to other issues. This can lead to serious understatement of some effects. For example, an option that trashes your environment to benefit your economy is likely to be picked by nations that don't have much of an environment to trash anymore, and therefore its negative effect on environmental beauty will be under-reported.

True. It'll still probably be negative, though, even if it's less negative than it would be on another nation.

Furthermore, if even one nation answers an issue in a way that goes against the nation's previous policy (which is fairly likely to happen at some point, even if it's a minority) then this will update the minimum and maximum values, even if it doesn't do much for the mean.

To add to this, while the data may be skewed, it's actually quite likely to be skewed in a way that favors the people who are looking at it to begin with.

If you've been heavily pro-environment up until now, you're not likely to even consider choosing an anti-environment option, no matter what my spoilers predict the stat effects will be.

If you're seriously considering choosing the anti-environment option, but want to look up what stat changes to expect before confirming your decision, then data collected specifically from other nations who also thought choosing that option looked like a good idea is a lot more likely to be applicable to you.

So, when used for its intended purpose, this bias in the data is actually not much of a problem.

My spoilers are intended to help players who aren't sure what they want to choose, not to encourage players to choose something that they would otherwise consider anathema against everything their nation stands for. They're meant to supplement roleplay, not replace it.

Invariably, of course, some people will use my list for things other than its intended purpose. In that case, caveat emptor.

I'll also remind you that my program doesn't only collect data from old veteran nations that have long since solidified their national policies and whose players already know what options they like on most issues. A lot of valuable data is gathered from newbies who don't have much of a policy direction yet. (I can't actually say how much, since it's not something I track.)

[Candlewhisper Archive]

A few days ago I realized something very important: these numbers aren't generated by answering issues blindly or randomly. They don't tell you the probable results for average nations. They tell you the probable results for nations that gave similar responses to other issues. This can lead to serious understatement of some effects. For example, an option that trashes your environment to benefit your economy is likely to be picked by nations that don't have much of an environment to trash anymore, and therefore its negative effect on environmental beauty will be under-reported.

Totally true, and this is why its also proving a useful tool to me as an editor.

Backstage we can run tests and simulations, and see what an issue will do for an average nation or any given nation. We can also see the theory behind each of the changes, though sometimes the sim can do unexpected stuff for us too.

However this here is "real world" outcome data, tested in vitro, and actually is a better reflection of what an issue actually does. It covers a tool set that doesn't exist for us backstage, which tells us a lot of things we couldn't otherwise know.

[Trotterdam]

Well, that was an unexpected side effect.

[Candlewhisper Archive]

Yeah, you're inadvertently helping the team! Heh.

[Sapnu puas]

It is interesting that older issues, such as #426 has less results than newer issues, such as #810. Maybe people dismiss these more often, or maybe the results for issues such as #426, often result in one outcome, like inclusiveness.

[Chan Island]

It is interesting that older issues, such as #426 has less results than newer issues, such as #810. Maybe people dismiss these more often, or maybe the results for issues such as #426, often result in one outcome, like inclusiveness.

Either that or it's an older issue with a validity. A new issue with a validity of everybody is going to get far, far more people answering it than an issue who's validity is something very rare, like compulsory nudity or lottocracy.

[Affairs]

To add to this, while the data may be skewed, it's actually quite likely to be skewed in a way that favors the people who are looking at it to begin with.

If you've been heavily pro-environment up until now, you're not likely to even consider choosing an anti-environment option, no matter what my spoilers predict the stat effects will be.

If you're seriously considering choosing the anti-environment option, but want to look up what stat changes to expect before confirming your decision, then data collected specifically from other nations who also thought choosing that option looked like a good idea is a lot more likely to be applicable to you.

So, when used for its intended purpose, this bias in the data is actually not much of a problem.

My spoilers are intended to help players who aren't sure what they want to choose, not to encourage players to choose something that they would otherwise consider anathema against everything their nation stands for. They're meant to supplement roleplay, not replace it.

A lot of roleplay is based on stat-wanking, though. For example, I have a satellite nation that is 100% dedicated to science and information technology wanking, and another that wanks for defense forces and arms manufacturing. "Affairs" never really had a policy theme, and I only made it because I wanted to claim the name; it's now being geared toward economic and spending-related stats. When issue options are chosen for their small secondary effects instead of their more predictable primary effects, the real results get very interesting. For example, my most recently answered issue was "should the police wear body cameras?" and I was like "idk lol, which option results in me spending more money on public transportation/education/health/etc.?" ... Your database said that getting rid of body cameras was the way to go, so I did that but got the opposite effect... probably because people who play welfare states aren't enthusiastic about turning a blind eye to abuses of police power. Caveat emptor indeed.

[Trotterdam]

That just seems like bad roleplay to me. I'm in the top 1% for 30 different things (25 of which are conventionally considered good, 3 neutral, and 2 bad), and I got there without being single-mindedly focused on any one thing.

Maybe I should put a disclaimer somewhere that the economy-related stats (industries and government departments) are especially unreliable, though, since those do seem to receive the most complaints. Although those complaints do fall under:

When issue options are chosen for their small secondary effects instead of their more predictable primary effects,

The good news is that if you're specifically choosing options for their small effects, even if you get it wrong, it won't be much of a loss.

[Sapnu puas]

You should add eligibility notices for options, or have a tidbit of the beginning of an option; option numbers don't always equal what a nation is given, and despite some saying a combined description result for options "1/2", that isn't true—in my specific case, it is Issue #890: I clicked on the choices 1/2 for my corresponding setup thing, but it gave me the description for 3/4 "the latest "must-have" uPhone is 1/4 mm thinner than last year's uPhone"

Yes, I could've read elsewhere for the eligibility of my nation for certain options...

[Trotterdam]

You should add eligibility notices for options, or have a tidbit of the beginning of an option; option numbers don't always equal what a nation is given, and despite some saying a combined description result for options "1/2", that isn't true—in my specific case, it is Issue #890: I clicked on the choices 1/2 for my corresponding setup thing, but it gave me the description for 3/4 "the latest "must-have" uPhone is 1/4 mm thinner than last year's uPhone"

You can see the real option numbers by looking at the source code. However, generally, you shouldn't have to. You can also just use common sense. One reason I include the effect lines is so if an effect line seems obviously unfitting to the option you're seeing, you'll know to be suspicious. Which option seems more likely to lead to the effect line "the reams of paperwork accompanying any electronic item are a recognised contributor to national deforestation": the one that says "Since when have you been responsible for the labour standards of other nations? Crazy legislation is just going to add to the cost of production, and that'll mean price hikes and lost jobs, right here in Sapnu puas. Instead, announce that you’ll trust the industry to self-regulate, and we'll do right by the economy and by our shareholders.", or the one that says "Corporations should be providing documentation proving an ethical supply chain."? If you want the option with paperwork, then pick the option that mentions paperwork.

Besides, the very fact that the options are listed as "1/2" and "3/4" clearly implies that you're not expected to get both at the same time. You don't need to know the validity - you just need to know that there is a validity which will make you see only one or the other.

For that matter, you're supposed to get suspicious if the version of the issue you get has fewer options on the spoiler list. If an effect line I list doesn't seem to make sense for any of the options you're seeing, that's probably the one that's missing.

Even if I did include all validity data I'm able to (which would require some guesswork in some circumstances), it wouldn't guarantee an exact match to the issue you're seeing in the game, since sometimes issues get changed and have options added or removed or reordered.

So, use common sense. If an option matching an effect line seems to be missing, then it probably is. If you can't make sense of how the effect lines match to options even after accounting for missing ones, then compare your issue to the spoiler thread. It may have been changed.

I try to provide a useful resource, but I'm not responsible for holding your hand.

[Sapnu puas]

I try to provide a useful resource, but I'm not responsible for holding your hand.

Okay...

[Candlewhisper Archive]

I try to provide a useful resource, but I'm not responsible for holding your hand.

Oh. I should probably let go then, despite the loving caresses of your index finger against my hypothenar eminence.

[Bedetopia]

Oh my god how did I not stumble upon this sooner?!

Thanks to you I've finally gotten rid of monarchy since your tool said it wouldn't damage my stats. NSIndex became almost useless the moment they discarded stats and you've fixed that issue.

[Evil Dictators Happyland]

OH. MY. GOD. THANK YOU!

Ever since NSIndex stopped listing stats, I've basically been answering issues and hoping that it didn't assume my legal team is made of morons who don't know how to patch a loophole. (Or just dismissing issues because I didn't trust any of the options, even ones I liked but had sketchy wording that would probably ruin my stats if the writer(s) or the editor(s) decided to rules-lawyer.)
Hopefully I can help with this, but I'm afraid that this nation is somewhat predictable in its choices.

[Minoa]

NSindex has recently updated the infobox for individual issue articles to link to Trotterdam’s Issue Results Service. There is only so much NSindex could do with limited resources when it came to issues statistical effects.

[Trotterdam]

Ah. So you did.

Good call. One problem we've been having is distribution of data. Some people only look at or contribute to NSindex, other people only look at or contribute to the Got Issues? forum, and it can make it a chore to stalk all those sources and gather useful stuff that someone posted to one place that people looking at other places are still ignorant of.

I do hope that my site becomes the primary source for those services that it offers, and that people who have information that would be useful to improving these services (such as confirming missing/wrong effect lines) take it directly to me, while other sites, such as NSindex, stick to their own specialties, and link to my information where appropiate rather than copying it and risk falling out of sync as it's updated.

[Sapnu puas]

What happens when your website is temporarily in a 502 error? I noticed that it always comes back up; what is the website (or you) doing?