G'day George, I personally don't think that cases need to be standing in water to stop the heat getting to the head of the case. As soon as the heat source is removed, the temperature in the brass starts to rapidly drop to below the temperature that is required to stop the heat transfer. I drop them onto a cloth so they slide down onto the concrete floor, again the temperature drops more. I really think it is probably more important to get an even distribution of the heat around the case neck than worrying if the heat gets too far down the case, especially in a long case like the 30-06, the concrete draws the temp out of the brass quickly.
When I have formed brass for my 5.7mm Johnson, necking down from 30M1 brass, I hold them in my fingers at the rim of the case, I can assure you that I let go of them long before the temperature anywhere near the head of the case gets too much.
I'm not an expert on the dark art of case annealing, but have read so many different ways that I thought I would try the quickest and easiest, which has worked for me so far. I may be in for a kick in the teeth one of these days, but I will continue to do it this way until it stuffs up. One thing is that I do watch the colour change very carefully. I count to 6 for my 20/222 brass and I think it was 8 for the 30-06 stuff
The best thing is that I was using tools that I already have and don't have to buy anything, I even rigged up a system to fill the little LPG bottle from a BBQ gas bottle.
The first time I tried annealing was in around 1988 when I had a Hornet rechambered to the K version, my brass was about 5 firings old, did the stand in the water trick, never knew if I did it right but I didn't loose any brass from split necks but did loose a fair few to loose primer pockets after 5 or 6 more firings.
Of course others will differ from my views, but hey, they are allowed to be wrong.
