[War_ooc] A breakdown of the old-fashioned World Report

[John Penta]

For laughs, basically, I took an old WR and broke it down into its
component pieces, trying to document it like one would computer code.

I'll include my observations afterward.
****

World Alliances and Rivalries World Report: Volume xx <--- Number to
advance with each WR

For all actions since <point>, advancing the timeline to <day1>
through <day14>. (Point can be game start or last WR, day1 and day14
should be expressed in Month day, year format)

United Nations Security Council (Permanent Members): United States,
United Kingdom, France, China, Russia

United Nations Security Council (Non-Permanent Members as of xx): <---
Ideally, UNSC non-perms will rotate every ? game months on staggered
terms. An application to automate the picking of NPC members from
sorted regional groups would be nice.
Until <date>: <countries>
Until <date2>: <countries>

Pending UN Security Council Actions: <any UNSC actions>
Pending UN General Assembly Actions: <any UNGA actions>
United Nations Secretariat: <any news from UN Sec-Gen?>
=========================================
ACTION RESPONSES
=============================

Countries to be sorted in Alphabetical order.


INSERT LONG-NAME HERE
===========================
Population Approval: xx%
Government Approval: xx%
International Favor: xx%
Economic Growth: xx%
Inflation: xx%
Unemployment: xx%
----------------------------

Insert narrative here.

============================

A breakdown of the action response section - John's best guesses at meanings:

Population Approval: What it says on the label - approval among the
entire population. Nominally honest response to the question "Do you
approve or disapprove of how <PC> is doing their job?" Approval only
shown, disapproval and Don't Know/Refused to Answer percentages not
kept.
Government Approval: Support of Parliament/Congress, the military,
etc. Like with PA, approval only shown, disapproval numbers not kept.
International Favor: "Do you have a favorable or unfavorable opinion
of <country>?"
Economic Growth: What it says on the tin.
Inflation: Consumer price inflation.
Unemployment: What it says on the tin.

***
John's observations:
So there you have it. The classic WR format as used last iteration.
Previous formats aren't much different.

I had to guess at the meanings of Pop Approval, Government Approval,
and International Favor. I dug through the OOC list and IC list
archives - nowhere could I find where we definitively decided what
they meant for any iteration of the WR. I'm surprised at that fact, to
be honest.

Much of it, actually, seems fairly workable.

I would argue that the person who can randomize and automate the
picking of UNSC non-perms would do a great service, but otherwise the
topline section seems fit for purpose.

The Action Response is naturally where everybody's attention is drawn.

Thing is that there is no definition, anywhere, of what most people
consider the key numbers in that section - PA, GA, and IF.

The economic numbers do what they say on the label; the approval
numbers had no definitions. Therre were no guides as to how any of
those numbers were to be effected by events - just what a swing meant,
just what a number of a certain level meant.

Very handy to an extent, but also very frustrating, speaking as a
player and a GM. I remember riotous arguments about what, if any,
effect they should have (especially for low numbers).

***

So what's it all mean?

If you want to redesign the WR, go ahead - I will gladly look them
over and pick the best format for use. This time, however, including
definitions of every field, to be posted to the OOC list on the short
term and to whatever we use for a web presence on the long term,
should really be seen as a non-optional thing, including just where
danger zones for each of the approval numbers lie. What might look
obvious at first quickly becomes rather less so when we're actually in
play; guessing as to what the numbers mean provokes a lot of
arguments.

John