Something that has been brought up a few times, but has not been talked about here yet is the idea of better terrain on the Eve map. Most of the North and the South of the map are flat plains with a bunch of forest for people to hind in(NPC nullsec/lowsec). This make them both very easy to invade. It is just down right impossible for someone to not have a foothold some where if they actually invade.

Any place there is actually some type of gap on the map becomes very powerful to those that own it. I can explain, the dronelands is basically a valley surround by a huge mountain range. There are a few paths you can invade with subcaps, but if you want capitals in there, you have only two ways to get in. There are a few more gaps in the map, like the divide between catch and delve, but not a whole lot more.

Adding in more gaps or some sort of blocks for jump drive. Forcing people to have to use certain gates/systems to go into certain regions, this would go along way to helping out in an overall SOV change. Maybe even moving the NPC nullsec pockets so people cant only just base out of them to defend/attack entire regions. Although let me be clear, if that was the only thing done it would be terrible.

As a side note carriers can warp faster than frigates and still be surprisingly effective at their job.

Hel hits over 6 AU, assault frigates go 5.5 AU. Unlike the assault frigate the Hel can afford to use those rig slots for warp speed and still be viable for fleet work.

Realistically these things will be keeping to battleship and cruiser speeds and used as super heavy logistics.

Fit up said assault frigate as the primary ship in a fleet, see how well you do against anything.