Yeah as others have stated (and I was the first? ^^) we should add back wide farm.
An idea is that you could weight the changes in income over time so that it favors wolves.
Ie 3 mins -> increase sheep income by 20%
and increase shepherd income by 40%
8 mins -> increase sheep income by a further 30%
and increase shepherd income by another 40%
obviously these are just play-around numbers, but I think it would help solve the issue, and still make the game more fun as it progresses further into late-game. More gold more possibilities! The way I see it is that you want shepherds to be using their gold as the game progresses, but sheep get a significant strategic advantage when they are all alive after 3-4 minutes and nobody is dead. The way to solve this is to obviously significantly increase shepherd income since that is the exact scenario we are hoping to change and avoid.
The gold-rates could also be different for each type of mode. IE 2v4 sheep should obviously get more income. 3v4 sheep get way less income. 3v5 income is relatively the same. 4v5 income relatively the same with slight favor for wolves. 5v5 significant income favoring wolves.
I base most of this on the theory that there is no permanent investments for shepherds, which has always been inherent in the maps. If you want shepherds to only use one-time-use items (OTU), then you need to seriously account for how shepherds deal with large amounts of farms. We shouldn't penalize either team for doing what the best strategy is... especially not massing (farm count) as beer suggested.
Depending on the results we may even end up lowering sheep income as time progresses, but I think we'll find more exciting gameplay for both sides if income increases and just favors one team.
LMK what ya think