"negative zeal" is an idea that gets bandied around a lot, but sort of loses water when people start mentioning maps like Semois. if you wanted to fight in the center, you couldn't help but be punished by the system or you would never be able to bring your whole force to bear.
my opinion is: give more options to defeat it, don't limit us by systems, don't force us to play a certain way.
Oh, and welcome.
If both teams have to blob because of a map then both would be equally hampered by this so the game would still come down to who used his units better.
Any way i know some COH1 mods that implemented this sort of thing and I think it would be great for COH2 has well.