cutting the number of chips is a simple cost cutting. They sell games without enough chips to do the set up so of course they are cutting the number of chips on purpose not because you don’t need them but to save $$$. Think about it if one chip cost them $.01 and they cut one chip from a game that sells 1m copies that’s $10,000 they save by not putting in one chip. Now I’ve found most games are about 15-20 chips short that’s between $150,000 and $200,000 saved on the production run. and each chip cost more than $.01 to produce. You’ll have to ask the fine people at HBG how much a chip cost to make. Revised is basically (speaking only in need for chips) as '42.2 but the chip count went down alot between the two games.
I can deal with lower the chip count as long as they don’t change the chips. The chips for '42.2 look great and them being just that little bit smaller is helpfull but they are different they don’t stack with the older ones and I have a ton of the older ones and would rather stick with the older ones. They changed chips for BotB they don’t stack with the other chips. So I end up using '42.2 chips for one power, BotB chips for another, and the normal chips for everyone else. And that’s just for Global.
If you play aggressive then you don’t need alot of chips. If you play conservative and play the odds then you need more chips then come in the box. I’m the most conservative player in my game group, (it’s not said but you can tell) therefore I need more chips. One player in our group can play as Germany using something like 12 total grey chips. It’s about style of play and the chips they provide doesn’t allow for a more conservative style but it’s to many for a meat grinder style.