How common are issue chains?

[The New America Union State]

I've been playing off and on for about 1 1/2 years now, and I have yet to get an issue chain (NSindex tells me there's 3 big chains and 3 mini "chains"). I may have gotten one of those mini chains before, I'm not exactly sure, but I know I haven't gotten any of the main issue chains. How rare is it to get one? Also, on a slightly related note, is there a way to see how many issues you've gone through in your nation's lifespan?

[Outer Sparta]

This topic should be better off in the Got Issues? form.

Anyway, there are a couple of known issue chains. I think you have to be eligible in the first place to receive them, and then once you go through the entire chain (or dismiss an issue in it), then you won't get it again. Overall, they're not too common.

[Westinor]

Issue chains are fairly rare, though there likely are validities to each one. I can't say for sure what the chances are that a nation might receive one, but I'd note that on my puppets, probably 1 in 4 have received the International Incident chain quite early in their lifespan(ranging from 200-500 million, with one or two receiving them pre-200m), whilst only my main nation has received a different one (The Enemy Within). I want to say that if you give it a couple of months, you're likely to receive one. The likely reason you haven't received one yet is because you play on and off.

As to how many issues you've answered, I don't think you can access that yourself, but I'm fairly sure Issue Editors have access to that. Perhaps one of them will let you know!

[SherpDaWerp]

As to how many issues you've answered, I don't think you can access that yourself, but I'm fairly sure Issue Editors have access to that. Perhaps one of them will let you know!

Recently, a shard providing this exact information was added to the NationStates API.

It's not particularly accessible for non-technical users, but you can see it by going to this url (you will need to add your nation name).

Code: Select all

https://www.nationstates.net/cgi-bin/api.cgi?nation=<your nation name goes here>

Once it's opened, look for ISSUES_ANSWERED. If you're using Google Chrome, the webpage will load as an XML document and it should be easy to find, but if you're using Firefox you'll need to press F12 and look at Inspect Element instead.

In this case, I can tell you (The New America Union State) that you've answered exactly 600 issues.

disclaimer: if you're an older user (like, pre-2016 old), this number won't be accurate due to the tracking system getting updated (or something like that. I'm not 100% sure). this number is still the best number you'll get because the game doesn't track it anywhere else.

[Zwangzug]

If by mini-chains you mean issues that are direct consequences of other issues without being part of a big chain, there are almost 50 of them now--because the issue base is larger we have more freedom to play around with niche validities and interactions like that. A few of them (361 and 362) were deliberately written as linked to test the chain system, but most of the new ones were just "hey, what if issue X led to specific consequence Y" without needing to code a policy for it.