[Baalz]

Yeah, Silent Seas might be better than Sha Bay and also covers what I had in mind. I do think it's kinda silly to be too worried about 70+ turn games. Obviously the outliers might be absurdly long if neither player takes the imitative, but that's the case regardless of map size. I just played a duel on Sha Bay (with 2 AI players, admittedly) and we were fighting in year one and the game decided by turn 20.

The thing is, in a duel you don't have to siege all the castles while your opponent stalls - pretty much whenever you're to the point that the only thing your opponent can hope for is to cause a lot of casualties going down the game is over. I've played dozens of duels and honestly can't think of a single one that even required a capital to be taken, just for it to be shown that it was all but inevitable that it could be.

In a duel there is nobody who is going to save you. There is no diplomacy. There is no point in playing 100% defensively. There is no point in actually fighting to the last man. When you can't mount an offense and don't foresee being able to the game should be called.