I currently have iTunes set to sync all unplayed episodes of all podcasts to my iPhone. (I'm a bit behind - there are nearly 70 of them.) Today I downloaded Apple's new Podcasts app, and was pleased to find that it "picked up" the podcasts that were already on the iPhone. I have listened to a few podcasts today, and just now synced to my Mac (twice). I was disappointed to find that the podcasts I had listened to were not marked as played, either in iTunes on the Mac, or in the stock Music app, and therefore not removed from the phone.
I can't seem to find any settings for the Podcasts app - either in the app or in the Settings app - that might affect this behaviour. Is there anything I can do to make the Podcasts app update the played status in the Music app or in iTunes without manually marking them as played or scrubbing through them?