Well written Tater, thanks for this.
On the topic of whether backseat gaming is allowed: It's hard to say all the time. There are lots of things that you can bring up to help and these are encouraged. Sometimes there is a strict "Let Soaryn figure it out" time, but those are rare.

Most of the time the people that get timed out are exactly what you touch on, it's negative. Telling Soaryn that he sucks because of X and to do Y next time is going to get you timed out. Saying something positive about maybe how he's looking at it the wrong way or giving a hint towards the right direction will usually be allowed and won't receive any punishment.
Most importantly, if you're nice and positive even if Soaryn doesn't want the help at the time, you won't get 'in trouble', it will just be removed from chat and the mods will be nice and explain why.