Not necessarily correct, the absence of AI's does provides a much more enjoyable and harder conquest but that still doesn't change my mind about this being a slower game. Normally I'm used to seeing a few nation killed in the first 20-30 turns due to rushes, with or without AI's, hell I always try to rush someone as soon as I can, didn't seem to work here doe.
I still feel that 3 nations dead is a slow kill rate, especially since there are some great players here.
And take a look at Yarg, turn 20, two players dead, and there are some on the verge as well, and I think they're all fighting it out.