CCP Quant presented a “Data Science of EVE” presentation in 2015 (time stamped to correct time):
That showed that the #1 variable determining if a new player is still playing in month 4 (ie. keeps playing after the first 3 months of onboarding), was whether a player had their ship blown up or not.
I don’t know if that is what you are referring to, but I don’t recall anything they’ve presented on a specific experiment (but may have missed that).
I agree. I think CCP Quant also showed that the #1 factor indicating that players will leave the game in the first 3 months is if they do nothing by mine.
Mining in highsec is naturally where a lot of players end up, as it’s an easy to see path to getting some ISK, but it’s so poor at doing that, that they are essentially stuck there and never get hooked on the game.
That’s the true evil of the game. Highsec mining by new players. Biggest killer of retention in my view.