In my experience, the AA EXP desk won't touch a RTW reservation - they'll (politely) make you call the RTW desk (tomorrow, if they are not open). They're smart enough to know that RTW tickets have 'complicated' rules and they readily admit that they may not know all the issues. I guess regular reservations aren't as wise and, for my part, it wouldn't even occur to me to try to get regular AA reservations to touch a RTW ticket - that's why there's a specialist RTW desk. The fact that you spent 15 minutes arguing says it all - after 1 minute arguing, I would have simply said "Thanks, I'll call the RTW desk tomorrow" and hung up.