String and weight anti-skate geometry?

First of all, I am not having any problems with playback but would like to educate myself a little on this subject. Please, no debate on whether I should or not use anti-skate.

My questions deal with with the geometry of the monofilament line to the guide pulley and what they ideally should be set at. SME, for example, states that after deciding what setting you want to use for anti-skate, you should position the guide pulley so that the monofilament is at a 90 degree angle to the anti-skate lever (or tonearm) at the outer groove of a record. I am assuming that the force is highest at a 90 degree angle, and as the angle decreases while playing a record ending up at maybe a 45 degree angle at the inner grooves, there should be less force applied.

Questions:

Is what SME states the best way to set up the geometry, monofilament at a 90 degree angle to the tonearm? What would be the theoretical result of setting it at say, 90 degrees to the tonearm at a third or halfway into the record?

Again, assuming that force is greatest at a 90 degree angle, would force decrease significantly at a 45 degree angle or would it only decrease slightly, if at all?

Thank you very much for your help.