The voting:
Option | Votes | |
|---|---|---|
| Pass | 1 | |
| Remove hits, move to EL via PH | 2 | |
| Move to cavalry, remove hits | 2 | |
| Move to cavalry, attack | 1 | |
| Pass to Megacles, remove hits | 1 | |
| Pass to Megacles, attack flank w/2 cav, remove hits w/rest | 1 |
My thoughts:
A typical vote: general agreement on approach (six of the eight votes call for removing hits in some form) with lots of differing approaches on how to implement same.
Passing is an interesting option, essentially forcing the Romans to commit themselves before having to decide what to do.
I'm surprised that there weren't more votes to pass EIO to Megacles. As one of the two pro-Megacles voters mentioned, it's nice to give Megacles two guaranteed activations (EIO and one normal). If Pyrrhus trumps (as happened last turn), Megacles will get only a single activation, being a bypassed leader.
The flip side of activating Megacles is that he's much less capable than Pyrrhus (initiative four vs seven), so it pretty much boils to how worried you are about the TQ hit status of the cavalry, versus how much more damage you could do with the extra guaranteed activation.
The majority opinion is clear: activate Pyrrhus.
That leaves the decision of where Pyrrhus should go. Does he remain with the left flank cavalry, or is it time to activate those elephants?
Again, there's a tradeoff between doing damage to the Roman right and propping up the Epirote right, and Pyrrhus can't really do both. And although the people voting specifically for the "Use Pyrrhus to Remove Hits" options were split 50-50 as to whether Pyrrhus should head east or not, three voters that chose other options favored leaving Pyrrhus in place (at least for now) 2-1, so I'm implementing the move according to that slim majority:
The result is a nearly intact cavalry wing. The two units stuck with 2 cohesion hits are the units with TQ 8, so there's little to worry about there.
The question now is: should the Romans activate Plautius or Rebilus, and what should that leader do?
Several folks answered this already in the course of their last vote, but I didn't want to resolve it because much depended on what Pyrrhus did. For those of you that thought ahead to what the Romans should do, you can resend (changing your mind if you want) or not, at your discretion.