Im researching in the hope to book 5 RTW rewards tickets through Qantas points for a trip starting end of November and ending end of January but so far having no luck at all finding anything that would work. Trying many different routes and countries but cant find anything. Im guessing by the time the flights come out for the end of the trip all the seats for the earlier flights have been taken? Am i wasting my time? Im also having trouble finding any availability for any dates at all for certain legs like Mel - K.L or Mel - Delhi or Mel - London. Only flights in and out of Melbourne i can seem to find are via HK or Tokyo. I also have not seen a single flight from American Airways (do they just not provide seats?)
I have just booked a RTW trip. The way I made it work was fly Mel - Hong Kong and then found flights to and from HK.
The other thing I learnt is that you do not need to book the full trip at once. So I booked my flights to Europe (on a multi city ticket), and then a month later I amended the ticket and booked the remainder of the trip. Changes to the ticket cost 5000 points
You will have better luck if you travel outside the peak period. Flying out of Australia in December and returning in January is peak period and very little if any reward seats gets released for travel during this time.
A high level of flexibility is also required to make these work. You will almost certainly end up flying on dates and routes that is not your first or second choice.