Hey Ziggy!
I think your example with the floating airship is spot-on, highlighting how your crew might use Compile or Format in different ways to achieve their goals. I would only add as clarification that the Rep cost of the Authority function puts the crew down to 0 (or close to 0) rep, meaning they have to earn that Rep back before they can Tier Up. You probably already figured that but I wasn't sure if the writing in my Authority chapter is clear enough on that front. It's similar to the notion of the "Weak" vs. "Strong" Hold that a crew in BitD has, where aside from narrative function it makes the crew go up the Rep track twice for each Tier Up. In HW, if a crew just really likes doing Authority functions it might delay them from Tiering up (there are a lot more ways to spend Rep in HW in general).