ShaggyPE

Truth be told... my game is $100 buy-in... and yes, I fill in the rest with $5s.

You've solved the problem with an incorrect assumption. You have assumed that the ideal situation is to use all of the chips in your collection. A better solution is to ask, what is the most playable breakdown for the poker games I am playing. If I am playing 25c/50c no limit hold'em with 8 players... and a typical buy-in of $20 per player... as an experienced poker host at these limits, I maintain that the ideal breakdown is: 12x 25c 12x $1 1x $5

If you have a set with 100x of white, blue, red, green, etc... your total number of chips used for 8 players is: 96x white (25c) 96x blue ($1) 8x red ($5)

If players lose all of their chips... they can re-buy with $5 (red) chips and make change from the players that have all of the lower denomination chips.

What I have proposed above is a proper solution if you want to play poker.