Hey @shauny - a series of nerdy questions for you. (Merry Christmas).
I too have questions about this. For me, it looks like variations do not count towards stats, which is frustrating to me, as it decreases the utility of the listings, and makes missing episodes complicated. I think that there ought to be some way to have animations and BBC episode audios count towards stats. That way, I can increase the accuracy of my stats.
Oh interesting. That answers all three questions. 
If there was a hierarchy, you could have (for example) an animation count towards your stats if you haven’t rated any other variation, but then have the telesnap reconstruction usurp it as a data point once completed.
Hey,
With variations being a very new thing, and stats needing an overhaul, this hasn’t been done yet but it’s a good point about hierarchy of variations.
I was aiming to have an average of all the story’s variations to count as your score for that story. What do you think?
But yes the missing episodes, having been the only and default way of rating an episode before, do consider tele-snap versions to be the default for now.
I’d like to hear more about how you think think should work and I’ll take a look at it while I redo stats in the very near future 
Oooooh! The juicy details. Thank you.
I think whatever is the most “definitive” or original version of a story should ultimately usurp variations and contribute to the average score. For example, the war games in colour is going to get quite different scores to the original, it would feel odd for that to impact the stats for the second Doctor’s era.
A potential issue with hierarchy is that it might not always be easy to pick which is the “definitive” version. For many people (not me) animations trump telesnaps.
But I think using variation scores in the absence of a score for the original version of a story seems sensible. As for many people the variation will be the main thing!
I actually thought of something else to think about here.
(Yes I’m thinking about Variations of Classic Doctor Who episodes at 12.30am Boxing Day, send help)
Should we take the highest rated variation and use that for someone’s stats?
My reasoning:
Some stories are just too missing to really get a full rating. So the animations can help fill the gaps. So I can imagine people rating the animation better than the original, and thinking it superior.
Other people may prefer the fast pace of the new War Games In Colour rather than the 10 episode version.
This means that everyone can define their own “default” version by whichever they rate highest.
And if someone rates all the telesnaps 1/5 but all the animations 5/5, it would feel weird to conclude that they didn’t like the Second Doctor. They did! Just only when they can actually see it move.
What do you think?
I guess I was thinking that the way to do it would be to take an average of all variations. I don’t agree that one type of missing episode method is always best, and I think that if the site has one kind of recon worth more than another, it would lead to unnecessary fighting and problems. Some stories might be better in different types. For example, yesterday I watched Fury of the Deep as an animation, because that was what was available to me, and I have generally enjoyed animations before. Today I started on The Massacre, which since it does not have any telesnaps surviving, I am doing as an audio. However, I could see the highest method that shauny is proposing as being effective also, provided that it did not skew the results too much towards positivity.
That is a really great point. You’ve changed my mind. Picking the highest rated one means that the first and second doctor are not disadvantaged when some “just doesn’t like animations” or telesnaps or whatever. And it lets people enjoy the stories in their way.