What I meant was a long multi-stage ko where both sides are committed to play it as such. Given you evaluate the threat situation correctly, there likely will be a point in the "five stage" ko of Bill where it is correct play to just connect instead of fighting the ko further. As opposed to that in the clearer examples of three stage kos, one or both sides have their life at stake and are committed to playing the ko until the end, without an option for compromise. As winning three stages already includes two eyes, I indeed have trouble to imagine longer multi-stage kos w/ both sides committed to playing it to the final stage.

In Roberts example, there is no ko fight because the situation is miai, then indeed one side will play all moves in one ko, the other in the other one. But this isn't really different from two standard kos being miai.