3
The line that was changed
Players who switched their usual numbers the week their usual numbers came up.
This is the most quietly devastating category. Somebody plays the same six numbers for years, misses a week, or uses a lucky dip instead, and those exact numbers come up.
It is also the one that is most purely psychological. Mathematically, a line you have played for twenty years has exactly the same chance as a line generated at random, and skipping a week costs you precisely one entry's worth of expected value — which is pennies.
It does not feel like pennies. It feels like the universe waited. That gap between the maths and the feeling is the whole reason people commit to a line in the first place, and it is worth understanding before you do.
There is a name for the feeling: anticipated regret. People choose the option they expect to feel worst about missing, which is exactly why committing to a line makes it psychologically expensive to ever stop. It is the most effective retention mechanic in the industry and nobody had to design it.