@Blake:
How do you still not… understand. By the time the dvds wete being produced they knew all they had licensed. The problem is how they decided to split them up. Especially by the time voyage 4 came out they wouldn't of out 13 episodes in it
They probably weren't expecting the crazy long turnaround on Season 4 from Toei. We now know Toei to be difficult, but at the time, Funimation was actually blazing through One Piece material at an incredibly fast speed. Remember, Funimation produced Season 3 first, then went back and did Seasons 1 and 2 and had Season 1 DVDs releasing within months of the announcement that they got those eps. The turnaround from Season 3 airing on TV to Season 1 releasing on DVD was only 8 months. By the time they finished Season 2 (lets say end of 2009), they probably expected to move on to Season 4 immediately, or at the very least not expecting a two year gap. Therefore, assuming Funi finished Season 2 production halfway through its release cycle, they had the second half of season 2's release cycle and all of season 3's release cycle to get their hands on episode 206 to make it a complete set. Did they anticipate not starting season 4 until 2012? Did they anticipate a 15 month gap between season 3 and season 4? Probably not.
Anticipating a relatively smooth acquisition of the season, they probably went forward with the original plan. Four sets of 13, then a fifth set of 11. However, with Toei dragging their feet for as long as they did, they eventually probably decided to just release the final set as is, without 206.
The turnaround on season 1 and 2 was incredibly fast back in the day. Season 4's was probably as much of a blindside for Funi as it was for us.
As for where I don't understand, I think you're the one that doesn't really understand that Funimation just doesn't care how many episodes you get on each set. You're still going to spend 50 bucks on it, whether there's ten or fifteen episodes. That much should be evident by the fact that 11 episode sets became rather common by the time season 4 rolled around. Ultimately, it's a filler set, one that came on the heels of the whole season 4 debacle. But it's such a tiny thing to be pedantic about.