Im speaking of Duels!

Lets say I move straight to the enemy and eliminate him/her before the time is up. Is it safe to say that the resource buildings are no help at all in this goal?
(Except the gold mines of course)

Better get the full answer from Mog or Req as I'm not 100% sure how the scoring works now but elimination would probably do it.

The resource buildings (except the goldmines) are absolutely of no use for this purpose anymore as you do not need the resources for troops or techs and you cant sell the stuff for more gold anymore.

However, as the resource buildings determine your tribute (and therefore score), I would be inclined to grab enough resource buildings to give yourself a higher tribute score before applying the coup de gras.

Pict sounds right to me, if you want to win, elimination isn't the only answer, you need dominance of resources to determine tribute, however, in most games, I think, as you advance you take the majority of the buildings anyway. If you rush and don't take any of them, before eliminating the other player you should probably detail some troops to get the majority of buildings.