I'm just trying to get some of thinking out of the way before I attempt honing. Doing it the opposite way would doom a decent edge on a piece of steel. Elsewhere in this thread we find:

"As I said above, if you take the tape off after you set the bevel and don't reset the bevel, you will not be honing the edge of the razor. Only the very back of the bevel will make contact with the hone. "

So the effect of the tape is negligible on the actual bevel angle, but it IS important as regards finishing the edge after the bevel is set. That is, whether one tapes or not will be meaningless regarding the final quality of the edge. However, if one removes the tape the bevel was set with, then finishing will really amount only to a very slow, and unintentional, process of re-establishing the bevel. Is that right?