[DaveBlake]

I don't use the web interface or Kore to initiate playback, and on the surface I can think of no reason why either of those would cause Kodi to play the playlist in a different way.

@pkscout they use JSON API calls, and because of historic design "play" takes different routes through the code depending on how it is invoked, e.g. item click on nav screen, context menu item, keyboard shortcut, Python builtin call or JSON. It is something that needs rationalising one day, but it is non-trvial to unscramble that part of the spaghetti.