Well, what an exciting vote this has been!
Interesting to see the fairly strong showing for Demos Drakonia in the last minutes here. They've gotten beaten decisively again, which may make Symmachos' life difficult, but at the same time it's a stronger showing than it was before. This makes me think that Linos' star may continue to rise, but the party will still be doing some soul-searching.
To a large extent I do feel like they were offering the right policies, at the wrong time. The Kerkyan expedition was expected to be a really neat idea, but ended up causing a massive furore. The merchant marine was a great idea, but cut off at the knees somewhat by us not having the new harbour.
What about using our free action to support Dmos Exoria plan for Messapi?(is Xenoparakletor from Antipatria clarified for it?)
While many want to tend to pirate problem it was pretty much stated that the problem will be put on the table if it escalate, if it doesn't we can simply chose Demos Drakonia next turn and deal with them while now we secure geeks in Italy and Messapi.
I am not sure I will allow a pirate expedition to take place this cycle if people don't pick it next turn. And certainly if I do it will merely stem the bleeding, not heal the wound. The lost trade route would stay lost until a more substantial expedition is dispatched.
Whether we help the Mesapii reorganise themselves sooner, or launch the anti-piracy expedition, is definitely an interesting question. Probably we will know a little more by the next update, to help guide us into our decision. We can see how the Mesapii are doing, and also of the piracy situation has had any dramatic incidents or gotten notably worse.
On balance I feel like the Mesapii will eventually recover and reorganise, whilst the piracy situation may get worse over time, which leads me to be somewhat inclined to the Illyrian expedition. But we should wait and see before making a firm decision, I think.
Obander seems like a very poor choice of Xenoparakletor to do so. (Edit: He basically the exact opposite of Mnemnon, who is quite popular among the barbaroi. His wisdom and lawfulness are much more appreciated among fellow cultured Greeks.)
To be honest, that is one of the big advantages of going with an Exorian Proboulos. Their commercial policy should allow us to strengthen our ties with the Messapii cities and get more information on them. (While Obander travels west and deals with the Italiotes and Sikeliotes.)
On the topic of suitability of candidates for different missions, one idea I think might be to do a user motion for who we want to lead the additional foreign mission, when we select it. After all, the Xenoparakletor of the winning slate is already busy, and may not be the best man to undertake policies they did not devise themselves, so I think there's a reasonable argument to be made.
So for example, we might propose a user motion that if we want to reorganise the Mesapii levies for our additional foreign policy action, we send Memnon to do it.
Or, by the same token, we propose that if we launch an Illyrian Expedition to crush the pirates, Linos should be the commander.