YVR Connections Guide 2022 onward
The above transit guide is very useful. It seems that all international to international bags will be transferred as long as they are properly tagged. As long as your bags are tagged and accepted by AC, NZ will not likely overwrite it but do check the allowance indicated on your ticket.
I have not heard of any circunstance where NZ would allow you to check in 4 x 23kg for free. I did enquire about the *G benefit and was told that NZ give the "extra" allowance to everyone so that *G will no longer get an extra bag which is totally made up and in violation of *A rules.