Remember when we had 2 LW arenas? I think the two arenas allowed a alternative from the horde of mass lemmings, 
Not really. Usually one country was hording one arena, while another one was hording the other. As most people are easily "tired of defending", want to grab bases and do not like to face the enemy horde (while having no issues with being in one), they tended to go where their country had the advantage.
ENY was kicking in much more often and more severly than today because of this.
