Wow, ranked battles are a whole different kettle of fish, huh?
Played my first tower and splatzone modes. Whereas you can get away with being clever and finding 'blue ocean' in Turf War, in ranked you absolutely need to know the map and where the best points are, you need to have an appropriate weapon for the mode and you need to be able to win 1 vs 1 duels.
It's the last part I struggle at but I still won 66% of my matches to start with so I was happy.
There are several factors contributing to the difference in how ranked mode play when compared with casual, I think.
One of them is that they are objective-based games, so instead of the team splitting up to paint ground, everyone rush to the objective, so you would usually get into situation where you're fighting several people with your team, or fighting multiple on your own. It's also more likely to run into someone aiming to kill, whereas in turf war, you could catch a ground-painter who is unprepared to fight. My experience differs from yours however, I have rarely ever run into 1 v 1 duels in ranked.
I think the other factor is that it's called "ranked mode", the name likely scared a couple of casual players away, so you're more likely to run into people confident/skilled in their game.
I agree that weapon selection is a lot different compared with turf war, since you could choose weapons that are better at killing than painting.
