I'll have more time to elaborate later in the week, but briefly:
Thinking of a gold system as a 'bowl' implies some form of 'trapping' or collection. That's not the way these systems work.
Gold is carried in hydrothermal fluids. These fluids migrate through the crust, driven by pressure gradients. They follow the path of least resistance - i.e. where the crust is most permeable. The strongest permeability is found in transient, deformation-related structures like faults and shear zones. Precipitation within these structures can occur for a number of different reasons, usually chemically driven. But it's important to understand that they don't 'accumulate' in a reservoir in the way you are imaging. In layman's terms it is more accurate to imagine the gold as frozen in the pathways that it is travelling along.
