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N-Day15: Give a Man a Nuke
"Give a man a nuke and he'll nuke for a day; teach a man to nuke and he'll do so at least fourteen more times." – Blackacrean proverb
Traditions can be such beautiful things. An event or custom that lets us feel a connection to the distant past, or things we do to help us appreciate what matters most to us. Helping family prepare special dishes and themed decorations for a plethora of holidays; putting on that lucky jersey before your team's next match because they wouldn't have a chance otherwise; pressing that big red button while blaring alarms signal an incoming thermonuclear barrage, knowing there's no way to win but you're darn sure going to make the other guy lose too. Ah tradition, a beautiful thing indeed.
Before you lies an opportunity to take part in a storied tradition of its own right, pitting your wits, courage, and button-mashing abilities against all comers in a contest of might makes right. We may be far removed from the sticks and stones of yesteryear, but one can't help but hope that our far-distant-cave-dwelling-great-grandfathers smile down on us, happy in the knowledge that their struggle continues these many eons hence.
The time until the Nuclear Apocalypse is shown below:
Click here for your local time:
Of course, the best part of participating in these traditions is side-by-side with a group of friends (or friends of convenience at the very least), so pre-register for your chosen faction here, swap stories of missile-launching glory of the past and updated bunker schematics over at 
Vault 41, and immerse yourself in all things Armageddon:
OVERVIEW
N-Day is an opportunity for nations to come together and exchange nuclear weapons in a fiery Armageddon of mutually assured destruction.
To Participate
Once registration opens, you can create or join a Faction (the full list of factions can be found here). Nations outside a Faction can't attack or be attacked. You can join a Faction when you're ready and leave when you're not (to stay safe). When joining your first faction you will be assigned a specialty.
Once the event begins, you will begin to accumulate Production. You will now be able to spend Production, fire Nukes and deploy Shields.
Watch your nation automatically generate Production. Use Production to build Nukes and Shield.
Launch Nukes at other nations and use Shields to shoot down Nukes that are launched at you.
Tactics
The simplest way to play N-Day is to join whichever Faction seems most fun and start targeting Nukes at its enemies while shooting down anything incoming.
Faction Bar
Your Faction page's icon bar shows everything you need to know, including who's targeting anyone in your Faction, and who your fellow Faction members are targeting. An example of a Faction page can be found here.
SPECIALTIES
Nations are randomly assigned a specialty when first joining a Faction. You can find yours on the top left of your nation's nukes page.
Military Specialists build Nukes faster: They receive more Nukes when converting Production.
Strategic Specialists build Shield faster: They receive more Shield when converting Production.
Economic Specialists can accumulate more Production: Their production cap is larger than the other specialties.
Cleanup Specialists can clean up radiation: For the a large Production cost, they can remove radiation from any nation in their faction, including those that were previously fully irradiated. They have no Production advantages.
Variable | Value |
Military Specialist Nuke Production Multiplier | 1.5x |
Strategic Specialist Shield Production Multiplier | 1.5x |
Economic Specialist Production Cap Multiplier | 4x |
Cleanup Specialist Heal Cost | 700 Production |
Cleanup Specialist Heal Strength | 5 Radiation |
BASIC MECHANICS
Producing: Step by Step
Navigate to the production tab on your nukes page.
Use your accumulated Production to purchase Nukes or Shields.
Purchased Nukes or Shields will go into your Stockpile.
Attacking: Step by Step
Make sure that you have Nukes to fire in your Stockpile.
On another nation's Nuke page, click/tap the TARGET button and select the number of Nukes to use.
Once Targeted, it takes a few minutes for your Nukes to reach a READY state. Note that your Targeted page is public: All nations can see who is targeting whom.
When your Targeted Nukes are ready, click/tap LAUNCH. You can find a handy list of targeted Nukes on the Targets tab of your nuke page.
Your Nukes are now categorized as Launches for you and Incoming for your target. Launched Nukes take a few minutes to reach their target. When they do, they earn Strikes for you and inflict Radiation on the target, which reduces their rate of Production. This also earns Score for your Faction and reduces the enemy Faction's Score.
If, after while, targeted Nukes remain unlaunched, they will be automatically returned to your Stockpile.
Defending: Step by Step
Make sure that you have Shields in your Stockpile.
Find Launched Nukes to destroy, such as those in the incoming tab of a faction or nation.
Your top priority will likely be any incoming Nukes launched at you. Secondarily, you may wish to target incoming Nukes on anyone in your Faction, and also keep an eye on targeted Nukes that may threaten you or your Faction in the near future.
Click/tap DESTROY to deploy Shields.
The number of Shields required to destroy incoming nukes depends on the relative faction power. If your faction is weaker, one Shield will destroy more than one Nuke.
You may also destroy Nukes that are inbound for Factions other than your own, but the number of Shields required to do so is affected by a cross-faction shielding penalty and is not affected by relative faction power.
Shields may be contributed to the faction Shieldbank, which will deploy them automatically, but with a lower efficiency than a human.
Cleaning up Radiation: Step by Step
NOTE: This feature is only available to Cleanup Specialists
Ensure that you have the neccessary Production accumulated.
Navigate to the Radiation page of the nation that you wish to clean up. It must be in the same Faction as your own nation!
Press the HEAL button to heal the nation.
Generally, it is ill-advised to heal nations that are not fully destroyed, as their radiation will decay naturally over time, the size of the healing is quite small, and the cost is rather steep. In most cases, the best use of the heal is on DESTROYED nations, which will not heal naturally.
Strategy
Strategically, it may be wise to avoid attacks on nations or Factions until you are confident of obliterating them, since this eliminates the possibility of counter-attack. Smaller-scale attacks, which damage but don't destroy an enemy, can lead to an escalating series of grudge-related nuclear exchanges.
On the other hand, targeting an enemy can be an effective warning. And it takes Nukes 10 minutes to be ready to launch, so you can't leave it too late.
Scoring
Each Nuke that reaches a target causes Radiation damage, which reduces the target's rate of Production generation and counts as a Strike for the attacker.
Duration
N-Day lasts for 24 hours, after which point, an Arms Control Agreement means that no Nukes can be launched. (In-flight nukes can still land, however.)
The "winner" is the Faction with the highest score; if, that is, nuclear war can be said to have a winner. Which we say it can. It's the Faction with the highest score.
Variable | Value |
Time for a Target to become READY | 10 min |
Time for a Launched Nuke to land | 3-5 min |
Time for a Target to time out | 1 hour |
Base Shield efficiency | 1 Shield per 1 Nuke |
Cross-Faction Shielding Penalty | 1.7x |
FACTIONS
Once registration opens, Factions can be founded by a Regional Officer of any region. Any and all Regional Officers of that region can update the Faction's official text to issue instructions to Faction members.
Factions can be made open to all members, or restricted to the region's members only.
You can leave your Faction, which is a good way to stay safe if you're signing off for the night. However, you can only do this if you're not engaged with the enemy! That means:
You must not have any nukes targeted or launched at another nation; and
No nukes can be targeted or incoming on you.
Note that in practice, this can make it challenging to leave a Faction, since you may be frequently targeted.
While outside a Faction, you cannot be targeted, and do not generate any Production. Leaving a Faction will also clear any spare Production that you leave with, but will not affect your Stockpile, so make sure to spend your Production before leaving.
Before joining, it's worth making sure a Faction isn't currently under mass bombardment.
Bikini Atoll and Kicking Faction Members
Bikini Atoll is a special, game-created, faction. It operates as a normal faction, but nations that are kicked from their factions will be transported to Bikini Atoll. All targets on the nation persist. Nations can be kicked from their nuke page, by Regional Officers in the factions founding region. Nations with incoming Nukes cannot be kicked.
WA NATIONS
World Assembly members will accumulate Production 10x faster than non-WA members, and have their Production limits increased by around 3x.
It is allowed to switch WA membership to receive this benefit for different nations, but (as per regular site rules) you are only allowed to have one nation in the WA at a time.
Keep in mind that if your Production is over the non-WA limit when you resign membership on a nation, the Production on that nation will decrease down to the limit (i.e. if you resign with 1000 Production on a non-Econ nation, the Production will drop to 750).
We ask that you refrain from switching WA for N-Day purposes more than once every two minutes. You will not be punished for this, but it is against the spirit of this change to the event mechanics.
PRODUCTION
Nations automatically generate Production every tick. The current tick rate is one per 2 minutes. Production can be spent on Nukes, Shields or Healing other nations (Cleanup Specialists only).
Production Rates
Nation Type | Production per Tick | Production Cap |
Non-WA | 15 | 750 |
WA | 150 | 2500 |
Cost of Producing
Specialisation | Production per Nuke | Production Per Shield |
Military | 2 | 6 |
Strategic | 3 | 4 |
Econ | 3 | 6 |
Cleanup | 3 | 6 |
SHIELD BANK
It is possible to donate shield to the Faction Shield Bank, which will automatically shoot down incoming nukes. This alone will not stop all incoming nukes, however, as the rate at which the Shield Bank shoots down nukes is dependent on the number of incoming nukes and its size. The exact formula per minute is given by:
MAX(MIN(0.15 * FACTION_INCOMING, 0.25 * SHIELD_BANK_SIZE), 200)
RADIATION
Radiation is generated in a nation when it is struck by a Nuke. The amount of Radiation generated is affected by the relative power of the factions. Weaker factions will receive less Radiation per Strike than the base value.
Radiation proportionately reduces a nation's Production generation rate. For example, if the current Radiation Penalty was 50%, 20% Radiation would reduce Production by 10%.
Radiation naturally decays over time, and can also be healed by a Cleanup Specialist.
When a nation is 100% Radiated, it is destroyed. A destroyed nation is no longer able to Produce, use Nukes or Shields, or Heal, and will not passively decay in Radiation. Only a Cleanup Specialist can 'revive' a destroyed nation.
You can leave a Faction when irradiated, but this does not affect your Faction's score.
Variable | Value |
Base Radiation Generated per Strike | 0.25% Radiation per Strike |
Radiation Penalty on Production | 0.66% penalty per 1% of Radiation |
Radiation Recovery Rate | 1% per Tick (see Production) |
SCORE
A Faction's score measures strikes and radiation that occurred while those nations were a member. It is unaffected by nations joining or leaving the Faction.
A Faction's Score is calculated by
RADIATION_GIVEN - (0.25 * RADIATION_TAKEN)
GLOSSARY
Term | Explanation |
Production | Used to buy Nukes and Shield. Automatically generated by all non-destroyed nations in a Faction. |
Nuke | Unholy instrument of death and destruction. |
Stockpiled Nuke | A Nuke that has been purchased with Production and is sitting idle, awaiting a target. |
Targeted Nuke | A Nuke that has been targeted at a nation. A targeted Nuke takes 10 minutes to achieve a READY state, after which it may be launched. |
Launched/Incoming/In-Flight Nuke | A Nuke that has been launched at a nation and is currently chewing up 3-5 minutes of in-flight time. |
Shield | A unit of defensive technology. Possibly involves lasers or satellites or something. |
Strike | A record of how many Nukes have successfully landed on targets. |
Radiation | A record of how many Nukes have struck the nation. Reduces Production generation. |
Faction | A group of nations sharing a common interest in survival and/or bloodlust. |
Score | The Faction Score |
Issues Contest: Red October Edition
Dobrii den, tovarisch!
The People's Issue Editing Team has noticed a major problem: while there are many issues that are faced only by the capitalist pigs, there are but a few exclusive to the socialist cause. This is unacceptable. We must seize the means of issues writing!
Therefore, we are proud to announce the first-ever themed Issues Contest, held between September 29 and November 7. Here are the rules:
- You must submit your issue between September 29 and November 7,
- You must check the "this is an entry for the Issues Contest" box, and
- Your issue must be only valid for socialist nations.
Winners will be guaranteed to receive the Medal of Issues Writing. We believe in "from each according to their ability, to each according to their need", so if you need help, just get down to Got Issues to get advice from us and other authors.
Remember that you only get one entry and that coauthored submissions don't count, and, as always, za zdorovie!
Ten Million Nations
It happened! Our nation counter just ticked over 10,000,000 nations created since NationStates was born.
Only 300,000 or so of those are active, of course. We're coming up on our 24th birthday; a lot of nations have come and gone. It seems like only yesterday we were celebrating 500,000 nations, but it wasn't. It definitely wasn't.
The ten millionth nation was, no lie, NS 10 Millionth Nation. So someone was paying attention.
Tranches: Now You Can Adopt En Masse
No! Of course you can't! That's why we're introducing Tranches. A tranche is a bundle of General Assembly resolutions. What's in it? Well, that's up to the author of each tranche. Any nation can create a tranche and pack it full of whichever resolutions they like. Then any other World Assembly member nation can follow it, adopt its recommendations in one hit, and continue receiving its recommendations as new GA resolutions pass.
Of course, not everyone will agree on which resolutions are best — just like not everyone agrees my nation is the best, even though it clearly is. That's why, when it comes to tranches, you probably want to seek out ones that fit your own particular nation's vision.
Which will those be? Who knows! I'm writing this before there are any tranches. I don't know what you people will do. But I'm sure they'll be good.
GA Compliance is Now 75%
During this time, we debuted our optional compliance system, where each nation can individually choose which GA resolutions to adopt (if any!), rather than having them all imposed universally. But there are consequences for nations who don't adopt enough resolutions. Until now, these consequences have been purely theoretical, but since the tenth resolution has passed, there is a real 75% minimum adoption threshold to retain voting power in the World Assembly.
In other words:
If you want to vote on World Assembly resolutions, you must adopt 75% or more of active GA resolutions.
Some resolutions already have high adoption numbers even without this incentive, and we look forward to seeing that increase.
And if you're thinking, "This is starting to feel like a lot of resolutions to manage individually..." we have something coming soon on that front, too.
Newspaper Makeover
Your nation's newspaper, which has been faithfully delivering issues in headline form since 2011, just gained two variants.
As well as the classic version, there is now a slightly more breathless tabloid, for those stories that are a little more SHOCKING and HARD TO BELIEVE. And there's a more subtle broadsheet for readers who aren't impressed by frivolous details such as color pictures.
This feels like a good time to mention there are over 1,850 different issues your nation can face, with a combined total of over 7,000 choices. And you might be thinking, well, Max, that's not so impressive, I bet my AI assistant could write a lot of issues if I asked, but wait! Each of these has been lovingly hand-crafted by real authors and editors who desire nothing more than to expose the hypocritical lunacy offered by modern political so-called choice. I think that's nice.
On Display
The winners of our first ever banner contest have been patiently waiting for their entries to appear in-game, and they arrived today! All ten banners are now available to any nation that successfully achieves the necessary unlock criteria. A further 31 new banners have also been added, so look out for them as well.
Thanks again to everyone who participated!
Issue Contest 2026: The Winners
This year we received an astonishing 139 submissions from our very talented community. After a careful evaluation process that involved a bizarre gardening gnome accident, we are pleased to announce that for ten lucky users, tonight, we’ll be rocking them tonight, because they will walk home as this year’s winners! The winners, in alphabetical order by author, are:
“First Past the Deal” by
The Hidden Pirate Cove of Chan Island
“Hostile Takeover” by
The Eternal Radiance of Cretox State
“Thief Rex” by
The United Peoples of Dexterra
“Call no Man Happy Until He is Dead” by
The Most Kingly Commonwealth of Haloginland
“No Truce with the Tourists” by
The Arguments of Hemogard
“Parks and Depredation” by
The Socialist Republic of Krusavich
“Insert Headline Here” by
The Most Serene Republic of North Southumberland
“Instruments of Destruction” by
The Suspicious Minds of The Realizer
“Legally Binned” by
The Republic of Rudastan
“Architects of Tomorrow” by
The Cosmocratic Order of Valrifell
They will not only see their issues published in the near future, but four will be
receiving their very first "Issues Author" badge. Which means keep your eyes peeled on
your inboxes
or the Issues thread in
the "Got Issues?" forum for them. Congrats to all, and remember to keep dancing to the pipes of Pan!
A Big Day, Generally Speaking
General Assembly this, General Assembly that. You'd think we have nothing else to post about. But IT HAS HAPPENED: the greatest revamp in our 23-year history of international legislation, or at least since we got lawyered by the United Nations.
There are several preview News posts on this very page that you've already carefully studied, of course, but here's your headline summary of what's new right now:
The entire 862-resolution corpus of the General Assembly has been archived. While you're there, notice resolutions are now searchable. How convenient!
The fresh-faced all-new General Assembly has 0 resolutions on the books
The newly-elected WA Secretariat (congratulations
Varanius,
UPC,
Merethin,
Islandwalk, and
Moduland!)
will attach Opinions to at-vote resolutions,
telling you how to vote, if you know what's good for you
Resolutions have a World Census analysis, which previews what they might do to your nation, stats-wise
Resolutions won't be automatically implemented in your nation any more — instead you choose whether to adopt them. If you don't adopt a certain minimum percentage of resolutions, you'll be barred from voting on new legislation, but for this introductory period, that percentage is 0%.
This is the culmination of a huge effort from many people over more time than really bears thinking about, some of which is documented in the Working Paper and the Plan. Thank you to everyone who contributed, especially the really persistent ones (both on staff and not), and our invaluable NS3 beta testers.
This is a big moment in terms of what it means for the future, but also for closing the book on past accomplishments. Is the final NationStates GA body of work superior to the actual United Nations'? I mean, that's not for me to judge, but we do have resolutions on Freedom of Travel (#601), International Scientific Cooperation (#615), Statelessness (#386), Landmine Safety (#356), Infectious Disease Control (#320), Biomedical Donor Rights (#217), AND Regulating Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (#748). And not all of them have been repealed. So you tell me.
General Assembly 2026: Elections Imminent!
With the GA2026 updates set to launch next week, elections for the inaugural World Assembly Secretariat are commencing imminently, to ensure officials are settled comfortably into their offices, and lobbyists know whose hands to shake.
Candidate entry opens in:
Click here for your local time:
For more information on how the elections work, see our previous deep dive, and join in the debate in the new Secretariat Chambers!
General Assembly 2026: Adopting and Complying with Proposals
This is our third and final of our "deep dives" into the changes being brought to a General Assembly Near You in just a short while! During our announcement post, we revealed that we were going to be able to make significant changes to the way we treat compliance with General Assembly resolutions. We originally called this feature "Compliance" but have now changes the name to "Adoption."
The old systemUp until now, every time the General Assembly passed a resolution, every single member of the World Assembly was immediately brought into compliance with that resolution via statistical changes; see more on how these changes were determined in this previous deep dive.
What's changingNow, nations must actively choose to adopt passed General Assembly resolutions, only after which will statistical changes be implemented. To be able to retain voting power in the World Assembly, nations must have adopted 80% of all passed resolutions. If a nation falls below this adoption threshold, they will be required to adopt more resolutions before they regain their voting power.
What happens if I answer a contradictory issue?Once you adopt a resolution, that's it! The system roughly mirrors what currently happens if you answer an issue that contradicts a General Assembly resolution, which means that you won't incur any negative consequences, and your percentage of resolutions adopted will remain the same.
What about if a resolution I've adopted gets repealed?As noted in the previous deep dive, repeals will not have statistical effects, meaning that the impacts of having adopted a resolution are not undone simply because that resolution was repealed. What a repeal does is remove that resolution from being counted towards your compliance threshold. This means that if 5 resolutions have been passed and you've adopted 4, and then one of the resolutions you've adopted gets repealed, you'll be brought from 80% to 75% adoption, meaning that you would need to adopt an additional resolution to maintain your voting power.
What if I've newly joined the World Assembly and don't want to read through all previously passed resolutions?There will be a button that very conveniently lets you adopt all active resolutions, which will be applied in sequential order.
What if I adopt a resolution and then regret it?In this case, we give the same advice we give to people who answer an issue option and then regret it: you'll eventually get the chance to reverse it if you continue playing the game and answering issues.
What if I'm the delegate of a region and accidentally go below the adoption threshold?The only thing that will happen is that you will not be able to vote or approve new proposals. Losing voting power does not impact your status as delegate, your endorsements, or any mechanics outside of the World Assembly.
General Assembly 2026: Custom Statistical Effects for Resolutions
This is the second of our 'deep dive' threads into new features coming to the General Assembly next month. Stay tuned for more!
Wait, don't resolutions already have statistical effects?
Yes, but until the GA2026 update, statistical effects are determined by the resolution's category, and otherwise do not vary. Category-based effects are quite limited, which means sometimes there's only a weak connection between the text of a resolution and its statistical effects. We want to change that, so the resolution's text is more accurately translated into real stats impact.
How will the statistical effects be determined?
There's two pieces of the puzzle here: you, the player, and us, the site staff team. Write your proposal any way you want! If you want to outlaw all basket weaving, go for it. Sometime after your proposal is submitted, but before it goes to vote, the Issues Editing team will internally discuss and write statistics based on your writing, just like we do for Issues. If and when your proposal reaches the voting floor and becomes a General Assembly resolution, you will start to see baskets across the world become unwoven before your very eyes!
Who are Issues Editors and why do they get to decide stats?
Issues Editors help polish player-submitted issues and code their statistical effects, along with other writing tasks. They're site experts on translating words into math, and multiple people will look at each issue and resolution to determine its stats. If a proposal is in the queue but Issue Editors haven't finalized its stats, it won't go to vote, but we don't expect hold-ups.
Will my national policies be affected by resolutions?
Resolutions will be capable of setting and canceling policies in nations, yes. Due to another new feature, nations will also have more choice over which resolutions to adopt — so those determined that their baskets shall remain woven will have an avenue to do that without being forced out of the World Assembly altogether. More on that in a future news post.
Will I be able to tell which stats might be affected by a resolution?
Relevant resolutions will display a World Census analysis on its likely statistical impact, though this is only a general guide based on a "typical" nation, not a guarantee of results. This analysis will be developed while proposals are in the proposal queue, and be viewable by Delegates who are deciding which proposals to approve. Here's what it might look like:
If I don't like the effects of a resolution, can I undo it?
No, just like you can't un-answer an issue. But you can mitigate or reverse its effects by answering Issues.
How will repeals impact statistical changes?
They won't. If the GA repeals a resolution, this will merely remove it from the active list, so nations can no longer adopt it.
Can I make stats suggestions?
You can certainly try by writing the resolution in a specific way, but there's no guarantee. Issue Editors will do their best to translate the heart of each law into statistical effects, but as experienced nation-leaders well know, sometimes the stats don't quite come out like you might expect.
What will happen to categories?
As mentioned elsewhere, categories (and the categories rule) will be obsolete as of July 1, for all resolutions submitted after that date.
Issues Contest 2026: Turning it up to 11
Ready your word processors, because it's that time of year again!
That's right, the annual Issues Contest is back for another edition! Reinforce the door to your office and gather your ministers, because this year we intend to take things up to eleven and see an onslaught of dilemmas hitting the forums. We hope one of them will be yours! If you like having fun with puns, have a penchant for policy, or just want to saddle the multiverse's leaders with conundrums of your own design, then this contest is for you!
What do you get if you win, I hear you cry? Well, if you are selected as one of our
10 (not 11, unfortunately...) contest winners, your work will be guaranteed publication
as a 100% official NationStates issue (and you'll also get the shiny badge that entails!). If
it's your first time writing an issue, that's fine! Mosey on down to
our Got Issues FAQ and Issue-Writing Guide,
and post your drafts on the Got Issues? subforum
to get feedback and critiques from fellow authors.
To enter, you must submit your issue:
in the month of June; and
tick the "This is an entry for the Issues Contest" box.
Remember: every player only gets one entry, so make it count! Additionally, coauthored issues cannot be submitted for the contest. All submissions are final!
Good luck, and happy writing!
Thnks fr the phtgrphs
After several weeks of deliberation, the Issues Editing team has come to a decision about who our 10 winners are! To make sure we do their photos justice, we've given each of them a cute nickname. Congratulations to:
Peoples Republic of West Korea
New Bradfordsburg
Glamorous
Northern Cheek
Uzibekistan
Ashlinsk
Natit Vakkazi
Thank you to everyone who participated in this contest! For our winners, please note that you'll be receiving an extra banner slot shortly once these photos are added to the game, as promised! Please note that even if your image wasn't included in this set, we may use your image in the future. If we do, you'll be notified via telegram.
Addendum (28/05/2026): One of the previous winners was found to be AI-generated after this post was initially made, and has since been replaced by Friends in High Places. The submitter of the entry that was removed is no longer considered a contest "winner" and therefore will not receive an extra banner slot. Additionally, because their entry is AI-generated, we cannot use it in the game. While we tried our best to exclude AI-generated entries (we excluded roughly a quarter of submissions for being AI-generated through manual analysis), some inevitably slip through the cracks when dealing with the volume of photographs we were processing. We've learned a lot about spotting AI photographs and hopefully, if we run this contest again, there is no repeat of this incident.
Global Trade Fair III: Metrics
Last week, we wrapped up the third Global Trade Fair. Some technical hiccups aside, it would appear that plenty of stashing and inspecting took place.
As always, this event is a challenge to report on in its entirety, with several different regions performing well. Most notable among them this year was The League, leading in eight different categories. Honorable mentions go to The Frontier Sea, Industriality, and Trica, all of which delivered strong performances at this event.
Global Trade Fair Region Leaderboards
Some event stats:
Nations performed 181,839 actions, including 23,427 inspections and 107,917 stashings.
The most searched-for items were Patriotic Flags, Inspector Uniforms, Cassowary Eggs, Sticky Labels, and Kittens.
The least searched-for items were Coffee Beans, Gas Centrifuges, and Electronics.
The Trade Fair ended with nations holding 97,926 unstashed items. The most commonly unstashed item was Cassowary Eggs (10,708).
1,007 items were destroyed. The most commonly destroyed item was Cassowary Eggs (323).
Thank you for participating, and may all your trades be fair!
Global Trade Fair III
*banjo music starts playing*
Come on down y'all to the third annual NationStates Global Trade Fair. Bring yer missus, bring yer kids, and bring yer truck for all the free stuff yer gonna take home after.
We got potatoes, deep fried, covered in barbeque sauce, WEEEE-HOO! We got some of them fancy cassowary eggs and you can have 'em scrambled or fried, whichever you pick. If you like coffee, we got enough coffee beans to keep you and everyone you ever loved or known awake 'til kingdom come. Every last morsel has to be eaten, so fill 'er up!
If you wanna represent y'all's choice of nation, we got patriotic flags, just for you. We got one here with the Butcher of Bigtopia on it, he's a cheerful looking fella. These ones have the Pun-isher logo. Thin Violet Line flags over here. Any of these offend you, we got these sticky labels and you can just put 'em on top, no biggie.
That ain't all though, we got wares. Y'all need tractor parts, y'all got 'em, all the parts anyone could ever need. We got some extra special ones that spin real fast if you want some 'o those. Over that end we've got all them fancy electronics, two for one deal on catalytic converters. If you need a shipping container to fit all that in, free ones out the front. You sort yer own transport out, that ain't our business.
Yer kids ain't gonna be bored neither. They can dig for gold in the sandpit, we filled it with gold last week and some of it better still be in there. Got some extra special fancy gold in there that glows green too. Make sure they put an inspector uniform on first, for safety, don't want them getting their clothes too dirty.
We'll see you down at the Global Trade Fair. Every family that visits this weekend is gonna get they-selves a free kitten. That's right, a free kitten. First in first served. See you soon!
NationStates Global Trade Fair
Trade Fair begins (click for local time)
Trade Fair ends (click for local time)
The World Census Needs Your Help
This post comes courtesy of Issues Moderator Bisofeyr.
A little known fact about the sprawling halls of the World Census Office Building is that there is very little sound insulation between the floors, meaning that the lower you go, the more noise accumulates. This would be more widely known if more people bothered to venture to this Office Building, but unfortunately its only denizens seem to be overworked statisticians and underworked tour guides.
Still, it's a fascinating place that is more bustling than ever, due to some diligent bureaucrats who are intent on giving you -- yes, YOU! -- new and improved information on your nation. They have spent hours toiling away with field agents to find relevant information regarding each of our nations, and improving existing rankings.
Now, they ask for some additional feedback from all the World's Leaders to ensure that these statistics (both new and amended) are properly calibrated, and for any other feedback you may have before they are launched around the world:
Nudity: a beach-loving agent noticed on their day off that our current rankings for nudism inadequately measure how much our citizens like to be naked, and has adjusted the algorithm to bring that up-to-date.
Environmental Beauty: when a national leader complained that no matter how much they restricted environmental looting, the Census did not denote an improvement in their environment, we determined that some adjustments needed to be made.
Most Superstitious: some folks rumor that the hallways in our building were haunted, and a bet gone wrong morphed into a measurement of how prominent superstitions are in different nations.
Respect for Elders: older members of staff took notice at whose grandchildren called them most, and decided to start tracking the trend across nations.
Most Discriminatory: some of the utopias among us complained at how they were not able to brag about how low discrimination is, and we duly obliged.
Household Size: someone once asked us whether the average size of a household correlates positively or negatively with economic output, and rather than looking it up, we painstakingly polled citizens from around the world!
Most Overworked: World Census agents needed statistics if they were going to complain to their supervisor regarding working fewer hours.
Most Attractive: some say that the creator of this statistic was sorely disappointed when they saw their score.
Multilingualism: one of our field agents travelled the world learning languages, only to find out that there was no big scale for them to brag about.
Hierarchy: if there's one thing the World Census knows how to do, it's sky-high bureaucracy -- and now you can see how your nation stacks up!
Market Diversification: we know the size of our industries, but someone wanted to know which national stock market would provide the most diversification for their portfolio, so we went above and beyond and ranked every nation.
Recycling Efficiency: we all know the adage of "reduce, reuse, recycle," but upon further analysis, we've found that most nation's do a really bad job at actually promulgating that message -- and now you can see how bad they really are!
Most Sport-Obsessed: sometimes when watching sports, I rip off my shirt and start swinging it around in the air to show my support; that would probably cause my rank to go up on this measure of how dedicated a populace is to their teams.
Funniest Citizens: following a night where Census Agents attended an avant garde comedy routine, they wished they had known how awful it was going to be.
The World Census thanks you for your time and consideration!
New Policy: Free Tertiary Education
Free Tertiary Education
The state offers free tertiary education to all citizens.
Fun fact: The last new policy was Cannibalism. This time, it's about nations who are not eating their own, but rather providing them with free tertiary education. You can decide for yourself which is better.
This policy developed by 
The Effervescent Esperance of The Ankhalic Vaspriot.
Send Us Your Hottest Pics
In the midst of recent World Assembly restructuring efforts, a WA bureaucrat discovered that the entire World Assembly Photography Division was accidentally fired. When this information reached the Journalism Division in three to five business days, a panic ensued as they realized how insufficient their collections were to accurately portray the cornucopia of issues the world now faces. This only led to further questions, such as why photos of Brancaland's capital look nearly identical to those of Blackacre's, or why the same handful of politicians seem to photobomb every image of certain figures. The World Assembly Fourth Wall Repair Division quickly silenced these concerns, but agreed that the WA's photography collection was in dire need of an upgrade.
As such, the WA resolved to do what it does best: pester your nation to do things on its behalf. After sacrificing piles of old legislation to Violet, the NationStates Banner Photography Contest appeared!
Banner Photography Contest 2026
The WA bureaucrats overseeing the project want YOU to go take some beautiful pictures and submit them for use as newspaper images. They've even promised an extra custom banner slot for the ones they like best! For all the information on what pictures they're looking for and how you can participate, see this forum thread.
Happy photographing!
General Assembly 2026: Introducing the World Assembly Secretariat
This is the first of our 'deep dive' threads into new features coming to the General Assembly. Stay tuned for more!
What's a WASec?The World Assembly Secretariat (WASec) is a body of five nations who are empowered to make publicly-advertised voting recommendations on all World Assembly resolutions at vote, both in the Security Council and in the General Assembly. The head honcho of this group will be the Secretary-General, as we thank Catherine Gratwick for her decades-long service in that role until now.
How can I become a WASec member?Great question! WASec members will be elected every six months, and you must have five endorsements to run, along with submitting a campaign dispatch explaining why people should vote for you. Once elections begin, every WA nation with more than 30 million people will be eligible to vote.
How do the elections work?Each eligible World Assembly member has one vote in each round of the election, which they can cast for their preferred candidate. There are two rounds to the voting process, each of which lasts for 24 hours. After the first round, the top 25 candidates get through to the second round, where they are listed in the order of votes received in the previous round.
The top five candidates from the second round then form the new Secretariat, with the nation that received the most votes becoming Secretary-General.
While the Secretariat will comprise five members, nations are only permitted one vote in each round of the elections, to help enable a diverse field of candidates to be elected.
How can I be an informed voter?As mentioned previously, candidates are required to submit a campaign bulletin as a condition of running in the elections. You can page through these dispatches when making your voting choices. Your region may also choose to 'boost' a candidate as their preferred choice.
In addition to this, candidates will send out campaign telegrams. To avoid people who don't care too much about receiving these being spammed, we'll be introducing a new "Events" telegram category and filter, so you can restrict these. Candidates will be required to select 'Events' in the appropriate dropdown menu when they send out a telegram.
How do Secretariat voting recommendations work?Each Secretariat member can post a voting recommendation with accompanying dispatch for every World Assembly proposal that reaches the voting floor. These will be prominently displayed on the World Assembly pages. The Secretary-General's dispatch will be displayed most prominently, at the top of the page.
Why implement WASec, and why now?The World Assembly is one of the most unique aspects of this game and we'd love to increase player engagement with it. Players will have more opportunities to directly influence WA policy through both elections and through serving as WASec members and thus implementing recommendations. This idea has been bouncing around site staff as an idea for years, and our techies are setting aside their coding time to work on this this year!
What's the release date?We expect to hold WASec elections for the first time in July 2026, with the exact date being announced shortly after the implementation of GA changes at the start of July.
For further discussion on the World Assembly Secretariat, please see this forum thread.
