I remember it happening, I thought at the time it was an attempt to mitigate NOE Mission Whack-A-Mole being too common.
NOE missions did not suffer from that as such, they only were impacted by the lowering of the dar altitudes.
One thing that happened was some reduction in strat runs (still central strats at that time) and those who did still traveled that far went much higher than before. Being 'on dar' all the time made them much more reluctant to try alternate tactics, even though much of the effect of increased dar circles was more psychological in this specific matter.
But the main effect was an immense strengthening of 'the horde(tm)'.
or one, many players were much more reluctant to fly outside the blob. And even more important, the dar coverage over enemy bases was much to the detriment of an severely outnumbered side. The 'lone ranger' trying to hunt goons to buy some time until some help would (hopefully) arrive was immediately spotted, fighters vectored to him and goons could easily stay clear of that enemy dot they could see way before visual range.