How We Track Our Players, Both Present and Past
Players join and leave guilds in World Zombination. It's part of the player ecosystem. Some stay for the long haul, some decide to find a better fit in another guild, and some simply don't meet the requirements of guilds and are kicked from the guild. (Thankfully not from the game!)
As with any organized guild, I collect data about all of the players within the Unholy Angels guild. I chose to do it every Sunday, because that's when I really have the most free time, and it provides a consistent timestamp for getting weekly data. Given the choice I'd like this data on a daily basis, but since this data is collected by hand, it's a good compromise to have the frequency at a weekly level.
So what data do I find useful to collect? Just the basic information that I could find in the players GXP page, and a date for when I collected the data:
- Date Collected
- Player Name
- Title
- GXP
- Player Level
I started this exercise on 3/15/2015, and to date I've collected 16 weeks' worth of data. When I plotted the data in Tableau, this is the end result:
What is this visualization telling me?
This is a growth chart, where the weeks are on the y-axis, and the total GXP is on the x-axis. Each line represents a player that has ever played with the Unholy Angels guild. The flatter the players line, the faster the weekly GXP growth. The more verticle the line, the slower the the GXP growth.
There is also a colour distinction between players who are currently part of the guild (in orange), and players who are no longer with the guild (in grey).
Then finally, there is a reference line that shows the average GXP of all the players combined, in the last 16 weeks.
The value of seeing players that are no longer part of the guild
The interesting thing about the data that I've collected, is that I now have a full history of the Unholy Angels guild, the players that we've engaged with, and when we departed ways. It's like reading a yearbook. When you look back at some of the names that you haven't seen in a while, it gives you the "oh yeah!" moment. It's also a good way to reflect on how we have grown as a guild, constantly bringing in new players and at the same time really developing long lasting relationships with the players
The images below show the players that are currently with us now, and who are no longer with us:
An Eureka Moment
A while ago someone in the guild asked me a question: "On average, how many GXP do players collect before they peak and leave our guild?" I thought that was a very interesting question, one that I never really thought about too much, but does have a really significant meaning.
How much investment do players generally make in a guild before they are gone?
Of course, depending on the guild's requirements, some players leave on their own and some are kicked. For the Unholy Angels, we impost a 5k weekly minimum, and players being kicked from the guild is the most common reason for them leaving. But then that does play to the question of how much effort a player puts in before they stop.
When I added a reference line to the GXP to show the average, and then added a filter to only show the players no longer with us, I had an eureka moment. This is it!
For the Unholy Angels guild, on average players contribute up to around 50k GXP, before they stop being as active.
Put in another way, if a player puts in the effort to collect more than 50k of GXP, they are statistically more likely to stay active in the guild and continue to contribute.
Coincidentally, our requirement to promote recruits to members is also for them to collect 50k GXP. This was set before I had the eureka moment.
Player level history
This was a fun data to see.. I have forgotten how hard it was for me to get to level 50, until I looked back at my own data. It's a small dataset, but I find it fascinating to see how I've grown as a player, and how others have as well.
