Done this way, any illusion of placement is created solely by the engineers and the producer, and has nothing to do with any recorded configuration of the players.
I doubt that details like phase coherency are even considered as an afterthought!
your right the soundstage created has no bearing to what happened in studio. I call most multi track projects multiple mono. I was taught to do the final mix with an oscilloscope and watch for phase, most don't.
Dale dale@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx www.longrunaudio.com