kolotok
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I never claimed it was easier. I just gave it as an example that, in order to defeat the Pope without trickery, I had to use the abilities of the Scorpius. The speedrun masters who posted above will confirm that if the task is to defeat a serious opponent with a small army, it is often impossible to do without using creature abilities. But I also didn't claim that he completed this battle exactly that way.
On the other hand, hit-and-run tactics or luring the enemy onto a tile takes time. And if a person is speedrunning, especially at such a pace, then every movement point of every hero is worth its weight in gold. Hit-and-run tactics will also cost a huge amount of money, even with diplomatic artifacts, and at this stage, he probably didn't have many of them.
If we knew what troops he had at that moment, we could make some assumptions. But as it is, it's all just speculation.
If we're talking about Richard Chen's speedrun of the Xiedu map, he posted individual battles. In almost all cases, he has one main stack - snipers. All other creatures are used situationally. Usually, this is 1-2-3 stacks of archers with 2-3-5 units each, a mage, a Pegasus, an Archdevil, etc. But there is only one main stack. And Richard Chen used hit-and-run tactics in one of the final battles to burn down the Titans with dragons.