Have been following 1stazmilitia's thread with some interest and annealing came up.  I do not want to hijack that thread, so here goes.
I started with a new batch of about 100 cases to make my 35/40 loads. I annealed these as a first step. I then lubed them all and expanded them to .338 last night. I changed to my .358 expander and it seemed to take too much effort and was noisy to boot. I tried relubing the cases without much change.
I was hoping that initial anneal would last till I finished and I would end up with the correct neck tension when I was finished.  So my questions are:

#1 New cases are the necks annealed and slightly work hardened or are the dead soft as purchased? I see the color on the necks from  the factory anneal in new ammo an new cases for loading. If they are already dead soft my first anneal was not necessary.

#2 should annealing be done with each step? If so after getting to 338 the again after getting to 358?

#3 Could I be worrying about nothing and should continue going to 358 before annealing again?

I watched a Youtube video of someone doing something similar a few years ago and he was happy if he only scrapped 1/3 of his cases, I do not want to be that guy! One out of 100 would be too many for me.