It's true, I didn't mean to knock the guy on using Mocha, I just keep getting curious because HaxChi is so insanely easy to setup and manage. I really just wanted to hear his setup.
Back @OP:
There's basically two types of tickets to use with wupinstaller.
"Disc" type tickets are tickets that are extracted from disks, so you're WiiU doesn't know it's not a legit install, and you can just run HBL -> wupinstaller and install this game with this "Disc" type ticket.
The "eShop" type is a fake ticket, and requires the sig patches to run these types. This is mostly content from eShop, things that aren't found on discs, DLC, Virtual Console, etc.
If you install the "Disc" type games, you only ever need to just boot up and run these games as is, no need to run anything else. However, if you ever want to run any of the "eShop" type tickets, that were installed with fake tickets, you will need your sig patches to allow this content to load.
So to try and answer question 2: You only need to run HBL -> wupinstaller to INSTALL stuff.
And to question 3: You only need to run sig patches when running eShop or DLC type stuff. If you run a legit "Disc" type installed title, you can just boot right into it.
Hope I explained that well, anyone can feel to correct me.
I'm not sure about HBL as .rpx, sorry! Good luck and enjoy the WiiU!