NationStates issue results

[Lumio Magika]

You're a legend, Trotterdam. A bloody legend.

[Trotterdam]

I shall endeavor to get that blood cleaned up, but thank you.

[Eshialand]

683.1 currently reads: "edutainment video games are taking @@LEADER@@'s students by storm". That macro should be @@NAME@@.

[Racoda]

Would you be willing to share/publish your code?

[Trotterdam]

Would you be willing to share/publish your code?

What do you want this for?

In principle, I'm willing to share my code if it would be helpful. However, I think this would be of limited use because (A) it's written for a fairly specific programming environment that won't simply run out of the box for most people, and I also have a bad habit of not commenting my code that much, and (B) I don't actually encourage other people to run a program equivalent to mine, since it'd just be redundantly gathering the same data (and if we were to combine both versions' data into a single better repository, that could be seen as violating the rule against sneakily exceeding ratelimits).

[Paffnia]

#1444, Option 1 (internally numbered 0) effect line: "Returning vacationers often find that their property is now a construction site."

[Trotterdam]

#1444, Option 1 (internally numbered 0) effect line: "Returning vacationers often find that their property is now a construction site."

Umm, I've already had this one up for days? Is something wrong?

[Paffnia]

Umm, I've already had this one up for days? Is something wrong?

Nope, I just hadn't refreshed the page!

[Rocain Founder]

According to the spoilers, issue #925 has four options, not three. This is confirmed by my puppet Cain B O-Au v0, which received the issue with option 4 present, but not option 3. The talking point for option 4 is "kids these days know how to throw a proper punch", same as for option 3.

[Vicken]

Would you be willing to share/publish your code?

What do you want this for?

In principle, I'm willing to share my code if it would be helpful. However, I think this would be of limited use because (A) it's written for a fairly specific programming environment that won't simply run out of the box for most people, and I also have a bad habit of not commenting my code that much, and (B) I don't actually encourage other people to run a program equivalent to mine, since it'd just be redundantly gathering the same data (and if we were to combine both versions' data into a single better repository, that could be seen as violating the rule against sneakily exceeding ratelimits).

I suppose that in my case the main reason I'd desire access to the code is as a sort of safety measure in the case you stop supporting it or disappear from nationstates. I use this data to programmatically run a bunch of puppets, so if suddenly the site went down or isn't updated any more I'd be in a bit of a pickle (and have to rewrite a similar thing).
I've also been wanting to look more in-depth on the distribution of issue outcomes or see how they change as a function of the nation's visible stats. It'd be much more practical to be able to see how it's done here than completely reinventing the wheel. Not that this is a thing I plan on doing any time soon, but it's definitely on my mental list of possible projects.

(As this is my first post here, I have to end this comment with a thank-you. This is a great resource!)

[Trotterdam]

I suppose that in my case the main reason I'd desire access to the code is as a sort of safety measure in the case you stop supporting it or disappear from nationstates. I use this data to programmatically run a bunch of puppets, so if suddenly the site went down or isn't updated any more I'd be in a bit of a pickle (and have to rewrite a similar thing).

Hmm. I suppose there is some merit to this concern. I don't intend to ever abandon this project (certainly not without giving fair warning first), and I am currently in good health, but there's always some risk of a freak accident.

I've also been wanting to look more in-depth on the distribution of issue outcomes or see how they change as a function of the nation's visible stats. It'd be much more practical to be able to see how it's done here than completely reinventing the wheel. Not that this is a thing I plan on doing any time soon, but it's definitely on my mental list of possible projects.

The basic program logic is really pretty simple. It can be summarized as:
1. Whenever the program doesn't have something better to do, constantly check the world happenings feed for nations answering issues. API query: q=happenings&filter=law&limit=200&sinceid=<last_world_happening_seen>
2. For any interesting-looking happenings (some filtering is done to get rid of happenings that obviously can't be used), check the nation's new stats. Store these provisionally, but don't do anything with them yet. API query: q=dbid+wa+policies+census&scale=all&mode=score&nation=<nation>
3. Once at least 30 seconds have passed since a nation's data has been provisionally retrieved (which, at least in theory, should always be longer than the 28-second delay that the API manual claims there is before happenings become visible, though I sometimes wonder if that's actually reliable given some suspicious data I'm getting), check the nation's happenings again to make sure it hasn't done anything new that would invalidate the data. API query: q=happenings&filter=law+member&limit=2&sinceid=<previous_happening_processed_from_this_nation>
4. If both happenings retrieved in step 3 are what was expected, then the retrieved stats from step 2 can be compared against the previously-stored stats of that nation to determine the changes. If the last happening retrieved in step 3 is correct (i.e., the same as the one gotten in step 1) but the second-last happening is incorrect or missing (or if no second-last happening was expected because the nation wasn't previously in the database), then the data cannot be used to determine issue effects, but it can still be saved as the nation's current stats in preparation for being used to calculate the effects of the nation's next issue. If even the last happening has already changed from what it's expected to be, then the data can't be used at all and the nation is dropped from the database.
That's it. Those three API queries make up the bulk of what I'm doing. (There's also a daily check to retrieve a list of all WA nations to save time on having to disqualify them each individually, but that's not essential.) I think I actually spent more time on writing the user interface to make stuff like adding new issues and identifying macros easy than I did on the core logic.

(As this is my first post here, I have to end this comment with a thank-you. This is a great resource!)

Thanks!

...It sounds a bit weird to answer thanks with thanks rather than with something like "you're welcome", but really, I appreciate knowing that I'm helping people

[Vicken]

The basic program logic is really pretty simple. It can be summarized as:
1. Whenever the program doesn't have something better to do, constantly check the world happenings feed for nations answering issues. API query: q=happenings&filter=law&limit=200&sinceid=<last_world_happening_seen>
2. For any interesting-looking happenings (some filtering is done to get rid of happenings that obviously can't be used), check the nation's new stats. Store these provisionally, but don't do anything with them yet. API query: q=dbid+wa+policies+census&scale=all&mode=score&nation=<nation>
3. Once at least 30 seconds have passed since a nation's data has been provisionally retrieved (which, at least in theory, should always be longer than the 28-second delay that the API manual claims there is before happenings become visible, though I sometimes wonder if that's actually reliable given some suspicious data I'm getting), check the nation's happenings again to make sure it hasn't done anything new that would invalidate the data. API query: q=happenings&filter=law+member&limit=2&sinceid=<previous_happening_processed_from_this_nation>
4. If both happenings retrieved in step 3 are what was expected, then the retrieved stats from step 2 can be compared against the previously-stored stats of that nation to determine the changes. If the last happening retrieved in step 3 is correct (i.e., the same as the one gotten in step 1) but the second-last happening is incorrect or missing (or if no second-last happening was expected because the nation wasn't previously in the database), then the data cannot be used to determine issue effects, but it can still be saved as the nation's current stats in preparation for being used to calculate the effects of the nation's next issue. If even the last happening has already changed from what it's expected to be, then the data can't be used at all and the nation is dropped from the database.
That's it. Those three API queries make up the bulk of what I'm doing. (There's also a daily check to retrieve a list of all WA nations to save time on having to disqualify them each individually, but that's not essential.) I think I actually spent more time on writing the user interface to make stuff like adding new issues and identifying macros easy than I did on the core logic.

Thank you for this! This'll certainly come in handy :)
Sounds like there's still a lot of manual work to it all though :blobsweat:

[Trotterdam]

Sounds like there's still a lot of manual work to it all though :blobsweat:

Oh yeah, definitely. It doesn't take up very much of my time, but I do need to regularly check in, even if just briefly. And of course, any corrections reported in this thread need to be entered manually.

I knew this was going to be the case, so I put in quite a bit of effort in advance to make a user-friendly interface that will let me do the kind of things that I often need to do quickly and conveniently. While that requires more work up front, it saves work in the long run, and I think it's a good design principle for programming in general.

[Marxist Germany]

The effect line I got for answering option 2 of #1455 on EA Corporations is

Companies have begun running campaigns to stop people from remembering their brand name.

Whereas the one given in the issue results website is

at least 4 unique companies in @@NAME@@ claim to sell Eckie-Cola

Are there several possible effect lines for some options?

[Trotterdam]

Are there several possible effect lines for some options?

No, I most likely just made a mistake. Fixed now, and do tell me if you see any other cases like this.

[Trotterdam]

With two reports of Taxation anomalies in a short timeframe, I rather suspect that the calculation of that stat has been changed behind the scenes, despite there not being an open beta. I'm going to go ahead and nuke all Taxation data, just to be safe.

...Maybe I wouldn't have done that if they were both from the same nation. Oh well.

[Compersia]

#1457,5 = Science fiction is seen as the leading cause of mental breakdowns.

[Trotterdam]

Hmm, okay. In that case, options 3/4 are probably for nations with very low religious rights (either theocracy or compulsory atheism).

[SherpDaWerp]

Hey Trott! You've mentioned you don't track averageness - I believe this is because it tracks your position in relation to other nations, and so other nations changing can change your Averageness score without any input from you.

However, Ideological Radicality is directly related to Averageness (such that Ideological Radicality + Averageness = 55), and you do track that. Massive credit to Valentine Z for this graph, which I couldn't find shared anywhere on the forums or imgur already:

Are you aware of this correlation? Or is there something else going on that I have no idea about?

[Trotterdam]

Urgh. This calls for some testing.

What I need is for someone to take a (non-WA!) nation, record its stats (https://www.nationstates.net/cgi-bin/api.cgi?q=census&scale=all&mode=score&nation=<nation>), wait a few days or weeks without answering any issues (dismissing them is fine), retrieve the stats again, and check which ones changed. I distinctly remember that, back in the day, someone reported Averageness rising even when nothing is being done. I never checked Ideological Radicality, and it's also possible that the behavior of one or both stat has changed since this was last tested.

[Rocain Founder]

I saw the suggestion somewhere (can't remember where) that Averageness has a dependency in the calculation on the age/population of the nation, or perhaps on the number of issues answered, to prevent newly created nations starting at the top of the ranking. This could make for a sudden sharp transition in the value of the stat at a certain age. But that would presumably affect only recently created nations. I'd suggest using a newly created nation for the test you propose, as well as one or more that have been active for a while.

Most Extreme probably would not need any such behavior. I would think it would be very hard to create a nation that would begin its existence at the top of the Most Extreme ranking.

All speculation on my part, of course.

[SherpDaWerp]

Urgh. This calls for some testing.

What I need is for someone to take a (non-WA!) nation, record its stats (https://www.nationstates.net/cgi-bin/api.cgi?q=census&scale=all&mode=score&nation=<nation>), wait a few days or weeks without answering any issues (dismissing them is fine), retrieve the stats again, and check which ones changed. I distinctly remember that, back in the day, someone reported Averageness rising even when nothing is being done. I never checked Ideological Radicality, and it's also possible that the behavior of one or both stat has changed since this was last tested.

I operate Obscure Issue Finder and SherpDaWerp in TNP, which haven't answered issues in 39 and 200+ days, respectively. It doesn't look like either their Averageness or Ideological Radicality have changed in that time period, though I don't have any pure data from them over that time to compare. Maybe the whole "comparison to world average" thing was a misconception?

Most Extreme probably would not need any such behavior. I would think it would be very hard to create a nation that would begin its existence at the top of the Most Extreme ranking.

If you make an Anarchy puppet, as I believe I started with SherpDaWerp in TNP, you get quite a high Ideological Radicality ranking straight off-the-bat. (If I recall correctly, it founded with 4 golds: Political Freedom, Civil Rights, Ideological Radicality, and Recreational Drug Use, though I wasn't able to maintain all of those once I started answering issues full-time). No idea whether that works if you do the psychotic-dictatorship route.

Come to think of it, that should have been an indicator that maybe the two stats aren't related to world averages - there's a couple thousand default-anarchy Womble puppets that would drag the "average" up towards a default-anarchy puppet, so you'd think it wouldn't start with a high ranking in Ideological Radicality...

---

Side note, rather than double-posting: have you noticed any reasonable validities for #1353, beyond what's mentioned in the draft thread? I have enough issues on Obscure Issue Finder that I should be able to gain eligibility, but I don't want to use them and find out after that there was something else you'd figured out was necessary.

[Valentine Z]

I'm on my phone so this is going to be a bit brief.

Of worth mentioning is that I found this nation which I have been fascinated for quite some time. https://www.nationstates.net/nation=long_forgotten_gold

They have not changed a single cent of Averageness for years at this point and looking at their happenings, they only have influence changes, CTE, refounding, moving regions, etc.

Edit: Though it is strange that their Foreign Aid has moved up and down over the years. I reckon it might be due to Betas, or back when they were in WA.

[Trotterdam]

Maybe the whole "comparison to world average" thing was a misconception?

Oh, I'm pretty sure that census scores don't actually depend on comparisons to other player-run nations. However, I definitely recall someone, way back, finding that Averageness steadily increases over time even when dismissing/ignoring issues (I think it was one point per day). However, that may no longer be the case.

I checked my records, and my information on Averageness, such as it is, appears to date six years back (2015). So that's definitely pretty stale.

Come to think of it, that should have been an indicator that maybe the two stats aren't related to world averages - there's a couple thousand default-anarchy Womble puppets that would drag the "average" up towards a default-anarchy puppet, so you'd think it wouldn't start with a high ranking in Ideological Radicality...

I also recall finding that Ideological Radicality corresponded to roughly "abs(civil_rights - 50) + abs(economic_freedom - 50) + abs(political freedom - 50)". However, you need to take care over the difference between smooshed and unsmooshed freedom scores, and I believe there was a small additional term that doesn't make a big difference, but that I never found an adequate explanation for.

Side note, rather than double-posting: have you noticed any reasonable validities for #1353, beyond what's mentioned in the draft thread?

No. Mind you, a one-child policy isn't even API-checkable.

I do note that the draft says "should come as an immediate issue", which I don't think is how chain issues work (they're not supposed to be able to have additional validities, unless the original issue was edited to have variant options where one gives the followup and one not). I reactivated tracking to check whether this is actually the case, but that may take a while, since this seems to be a really rare issue. My tracker currently lists only 20 data points (1 for the first option, 12 for the second option, 7 for the third option). Though oddly, the one data point for the first option is reported as being from just four days ago (which means that before then, it must have been in my database for a long time without successfully collecting any data points, since the effect line itself has been known for a while), while the other options are around a month ago.

[SherpDaWerp]

Come to think of it, that should have been an indicator that maybe the two stats aren't related to world averages - there's a couple thousand default-anarchy Womble puppets that would drag the "average" up towards a default-anarchy puppet, so you'd think it wouldn't start with a high ranking in Ideological Radicality...

I also recall finding that Ideological Radicality corresponded to roughly "abs(civil_rights - 50) + abs(economic_freedom - 50) + abs(political freedom - 50)". However, you need to take care over the difference between smooshed and unsmooshed freedom scores, and I believe there was a small additional term that doesn't make a big difference, but that I never found an adequate explanation for.

Well, even if we don't know what it actually is, we've at least established that my assumption was wrong. I like to keep my misinformation-peddling to a minimum.

Side note, rather than double-posting: have you noticed any reasonable validities for #1353, beyond what's mentioned in the draft thread?

No. Mind you, a one-child policy isn't even API-checkable.

I do note that the draft says "should come as an immediate issue", which I don't think is how chain issues work (they're not supposed to be able to have additional validities, unless the original issue was edited to have variant options where one gives the followup and one not). I reactivated tracking to check whether this is actually the case, but that may take a while, since this seems to be a really rare issue. My tracker currently lists only 20 data points (1 for the first option, 12 for the second option, 7 for the third option). Though oddly, the one data point for the first option is reported as being from just four days ago (which means that before then, it must have been in my database for a long time without successfully collecting any data points, since the effect line itself has been known for a while), while the other options are around a month ago.

I guess it was wishful thinking that you'd have already been storing the nations that chose #136.4 or #638.4, in lieu of checking a one-child policy in the API. I've heard a probably-reliable report that enacting a one-child policy before the abortion-ban doesn't lead to the issue, so your idea (that there's a new option on #136 and #638) might be true. The only other way to have it work "one-way" would be to have it be a chain-with-validity, but we've all been told they don't exist.

In that case, I might wait for one of the other three no-abortion-enacting issues (#426, #452, #1142) before I commit to answering #136 or #638, so that I can see whether the internal numbers change on those two with no abortion active. Currently my copies of both issues show 0, 1, 2, and 3, as per the spoiler thread, but that might change with an abortion-ban active.

With such an exceptionally-rare issue, I want to try and get as much information about it as possible from the copy I'll receive. (Well, hoping that I receive it at all!)