.

You mean vertical placement of the board? To be honest, I hadn't considered placing it that way, as the tutorials I watched both placed it horizontally (as it is displayed here). A picture of a game setup on BGA also seems to confirm this orientation (boardgamegeek.com/image/5178506/the-fox-in-the-forest-duet). I mean, you could place it vertically, but since it obviously isn't placed vertically, then that doesn't apply here.

Typically, I'd interpret the screen as essentially lifted from a flat playing surface - if you reverse that, and lay the screen flat (so you can still see the actual screen), the top of the screen is further away from you, while the bottom is closer. This is how other games are oriented (eg. Memoir '44, my troops are always displayed at the bottom of the screen). Currently the tracker is moving side-to-side instead of towards or away from a player, which makes it confusing. Sure, once you understand it's moving between the two card zones, it's easy enough to remember, but IRL, we wouldn't have card zones, we'd probably just play both our cards to one side or the other of the board, whether it was oriented vertically or horizontally.

I'd agree with you that that layout is unwieldy, though it feels clearer as to whose side the tracker is on.

I'd personally place the board beside the cards per the 1st image here: imgur.com/a/0TwMe37. Alternatively, making the board actually vertical and placing the cards beside may make for a better layout (per 2nd image).

But just my opinion, feel free to disregard if it's too much of a pain.