So, as I have mentioned before been trying to plan a TPAC trip for Sept/Oct.

I find an XF ticket for my wife to NRT and then onto BKK in XC. So I am stoked because there is tons of NC availability so I think I am set.

I go to book the revenue ticket for myself:

1. I try 9/30 SBA-NRT, then 10/5 NRT-BKK and 10/14 BKK-SBA, there is plenty of W fares available.
-Ticket only books into Y or M and comes up at $3900. I ask why, they say you can only do the stopover on the way back when transiting through Japan. Thinking that makes NO SENSE at all, I hang up call back and the next person says the same thing. They say if I flip it around and go SBA-BKK-NRT-SBA then I can book all H for $1695 or all W for $1235Really.....seriously??? Same exact flight numbers, same location same dates....

2. So I fiddle with the dates, flip the whole trip in reverse to make the trip start in BKK and end in NRT, no chance for XF only XC for NRT-BKK-NRT and have to waitlist XC for LAX-NRT-LAX. Finally find ones that work. My friend is going to give me 2 SWU's, so I try and book the whole thing in W for $1235, then I realize that BKK-NRT is more than 12 hours apart from NRT-LAX so I will now require 3 SWU instead of 2. So I call in to see if I can do 5 of the 6 segments in W and do the BKK-NRT in H. They say that H is not combinable with anything below H, so I eiither have to book the whole thing in H or I will not have the ability to upgrade BKK-NRT without a third SWU. Come on, once again, really...seriously???

Do they just make these comical and frivolous rules up out of thin air? Or do they do it just to drive passengers insane?

It seems like UA (and the other legacy carrier) fare rules are as complex and arbitrary as the US Federal Tax Code....Too much nonsense.