You do tend to surprise one, Tom. I would've thought you'd hate "match play".
Many of the qualities that folks praise your courses for strike me as the very ones that get under-valued or go virtually unrecognized in match play.
A variety of recovery options, flowing and walkable routings, seamless integration of fairways and rough/blurred mowing lines, and a "looks like it's been here 100 years" aesthetic just to name a few -- all these qualities are less obvious and (seemingly) of less import on a hole-by-hole match play basis.
Peter:
I'm not saying that a course cannot be greater than the sum of its parts, for all of the reasons you cite. Many of those reasons are actually part of the golf holes themselves, of course, and the appropriate credit could be distributed there; some, like variety or walkability, cannot.
However, I am saying I don't think a course can be WAY BETTER because of those things, enough to overlook a lack of interesting holes. Interesting holes are the most important aspect of a great course, no matter what order they come in. That's why I'm doubting that someone is going to offer up a course which would be great if you just changed the sequence and made it tighter. [I'm still waiting for that post.]
I've always said that you have to be willing to give up a great hole in order to get a better routing ... but that other routing is only going to be better if it lets you build more great holes.
A real world example: the 7th at Streamsong (Blue). I've heard some people suggest I should have passed it by, because coming back from the green to the 8th tee is a real break in the flow of the routing. None of them seem to understand that our other alternatives were to try and cram a bad par-3 into the land between 6 green and 15 Red green, or, have a long walk from the 6th green to the 8th tee, without the 7th as compensation for the break.
The three things about discussing "flow" that bother me so much are:
1) It's even more subjective than discussing individual holes; some people have a prescribed "flow" in mind [building to the difficult finish] and are dismissive of any other approach;
2) In real life, the sequence of holes on a course is not so easily changed. Only certain solutions are possible on any given piece of ground; letting someone argue that some course would be even better if the 14th and 15th holes were backwards is pointless, because it may never have been possible to begin with; and
3) Honestly, when guys start telling you they're not just architects, but composers of symphonies, I tend to go deaf on the first three letters of that word.
Surely, when I am routing a course, part of the final selection process is based on how the holes fit together, from the standpoint of variety and walkability and feel. But would you really have me leave out two or three better holes because they aren't as easy to walk to, or because two of the par-3's play north, or some other silly rule that someone else has come up with?