No, I remember they're spread out over 1/2 a sector (and even that can be a very dense furball for some of the larger hordes). But if you go into the thick of it, you can have problems egressing (eg, you get jumped when low fuel, or your trail of oil draws every lemming within visual range
). And if you work the sides...... well personally, I just don't like working the sides.
And I'm just posting this out of idol curiosity. Yeah, I don't (didn't?) like the hordes. But I'm just trying to gain some understanding of what compels people to act like lemmings at times. Don't get me wrong, I love missions, and flying in coordination with my friends. I have nothing against team work or anything. But theres a difference between an organized mission that intends to do some fighting, and a mission that just rounds up a big group of people and throws them NOE at a base.
Personally, I feel that a nice 5-7vs5-7 is about the perfect sized fight. Not so big as go far beyond icon range of most, if any, of the planes, but still big enough that if the fight is close to a base, people that get shot down can reup and get back in the fight before it ends.
But beyond that, I get the feeling in a horde that everyone is just out for kills, they don't really care anything in particular for the actual fight.