There is a valid cheat to use to edit the record you are in, using an action.
Make a report link field and on the left have [Record ID#] and on the right navigate to the same app, same table same [Record ID#] field. then you can edit the record you are in. Just be sure that you do not make an endless loop as the Action editing a record is an edit to the record. So you will need to have some filers on the trigger.
A form rule can be based on the Role is the user, so you should be able to differentiate between a regular Participant and a high level Approver.