oldbobcat

You read the narrative but did not look very closely at the orientation of the ramps, pins, gates, and teeth to the bolt holes. And if you read down through the comments, on May 16, 2016, Andre Bondeson explains that Tall Cyclist neglected to mention what he considers the major difference between A & B, the different alignment of those ramps, pins, gates, and teeth to the crank bolts. And Tall Cyclist did not address Bondeson's comment. Note that in his entire thread Tall Cyclist does not acknowledge the difference in orientation obviously apparent in his photos. Tall Cyclist's explanation does not explain why OP's front shifts started working after he realigned the small chainring. Was OP just imagining all this?

Nikola (the tall guy) starts his presentation with a narrative about missed front shifts, up and down. He says that about 40 percent of the time his chain lands somewhere between the two rings, and says that he is shifting at full power and sometimes out of the saddle. Apparently this guy has never heard of soft-pedaling, backing off the pressure on the cranks so the chain can loosen slightly and allow the derailleur to do its job better. Nikola has made an astute observation on chainring profiles that may or may not be relevant, but seems too incurious to learn why his chain is ending up in no-man's land on 40% of his shifts.