"For the above reasons, I still don't believe it is a 270 ohm resistor, at least in the original design."
I think I understand your reasons, as I'm still learning basic tube operation. However, as an aside, it's funny that every time I post a George Wright schematic, people find some utterly baffling choices that can take up a lot of screen real estate. The 522K resistor from 6SN7 pin 6 to 2 in the WPA 3.5 is another case in point, where your own foray into the topic sheds some light on its role:
https://www.audioasylum.com/messages/set/72516/re-wright-3-5s.
As a novice, it's amusing to see how George marched to his own drumbeat and continues to puzzle even experienced hands from the beyond. Wish I'd gotten into this earlier, as it sounds like he was a great guy and I would've loved to meet him.
Back to the amp, it appears to me that the 270ohm resistor is indeed intentional despite the loss of gain. The owner of the amps says he bought them directly from George in 2001 and they've never been modified. Maybe the oral history is inaccurate due to faulty memory or something, but every day he listens to and enjoys the very amps we're picking apart here. So it's not just a hypothetical.
Let's suppose that what I see as a brown multiplier stripe in several images is a discolored red or orange one. CB has already given his doubts about that, but here's how the model changes assuming a red (x100) or orange (x1000) stripe with the same op point of 300Vak/60mA on the 300B:
Red stripe -- Rp2 2.7K
B+: 354.4V
300B: 300Vak (60.2mA)
6EM71 plate/cathode: 186.4V/2.6V (834.4uA)
6EM72 plate/cathode: 196V/27.4V (27.4mA)
Can take up to 3.25V singal before clipping
Orange stripe -- Rp2 27K
B+: 357.8V
300B: 301.3Vak (63.3mA)
6EM71 plate/cathode: 227V/3.1V (994uA)
6EM72 plate/cathode: 70.9V/9.5V (9.46mA)
Can take up to 0.7V signal before clipping
And one final thing I want to bring up because it could be a clue to the op point of 6EM7 section 1: the 3.09K carbon film resistor at Rk has the number "2" printed on it in both amps. I've never seen that before. Does it have a bearing on the resistance value? Pic attached.