Hi there, are the new docs created outside of using Couchbase Lite/Sync Gateway? There is a known compatibility issue (http://docs.couchbase.com/sync-gateway/#limitations) that we are working on, using a solution called ‘Bucket Shadowing’: https://github.com/couchbase/sync_gateway/wiki/Bucket-Shadowing
It’s unclear if that is necessarily the issue, but to answer a few of your questions: yes, using GUEST and not using channels would mean that a data set stored to Couchbase Server via a Couchbase Lite client will be synced down to all other Couchbase Lite clients.