I think we're talking about how the mirrored skirmish was being developed for about six months, and when the tournament was organized, it turned out that people weren't interested. But they could have just released it so that people could test it, fix the bugs, and hold a proper tournament.
Besides, it's much easier with the L-shaped maps because they have been tested in Battle Tactics for many years, and there is experience, so there are no more "childhood diseases" there, except perhaps for minor adjustments, and even that is unlikely.
I asked Wizard to release it officially; we're waiting.
Regarding the rules, it doesn't really matter; you can play with the rule of shifted guards. We just played without it in Battle Tactics, and there were no complaints.
The only bottleneck here is the rules for choosing colors and heroes; I don't know yet what the best way to do it is. In Battle Tactics, there was the option to start with the same heroes, but this is not available in Sword of Destiny (maybe it will be later). The simplest option is to have random starting heroes and negotiate the color.