The "30 second chat beat a whole stack of manuals" line is doing a lot of work here. One good tip from a guy who happened to know your exact situation doesn't mean counter guys beat books, it means you got lucky and found someone with real time in. For every Gary counter guy who gives you gold there's ten who'll tell you something flat wrong with total confidence and you won't find out until the part fails. A book or a code spec is checked, reviewed, and the same for everyone, while counter advice is one person's habits passed down and half the time they can't even tell you why it works. That slow root pass thing, fine on your test plate, but did you run it on the actual vessel or just trust it because the bead looked pretty? Books don't get tired, don't get cranky, and don't retire, so leaning on them isn't the weak move you're making it out to be.