Using EV when Starting From a Stop?

Those 6 bars still weren't as free as you're making them out to be. The other car still had the same amount of potential energy when it was sitting at the top of the hill. It could have used friction brakes the whole way down and turned most of that energy into heat, or it could have coasted the whole way and been going 100MPH and coasted several more miles after the bottom of the hill (unlikely, but just to illustrate the concept). Every time you convert the energy, you lose some. So the most efficient thing to do is to get the car up to speed and let it coast, not try to capture that energy with regen (if the conditions allow). Do pulse and glide for a few miles along the same route twice, once actually gliding, the other regening. You'll get better mileage coasting.
I'm not saying regen and EV are bad. I'm saying they're not free, the energy doesn't come from another dimension. If a light turns red right before you get to it, you have to stop. In a normal car, all the energy would be wasted as heat, but the Prius captures some of it. Either way, 2 cars of the same weight going the same speed will have the same amount of energy to dissipate.

 

I am not sure what you are trying to say. I did not discuss using EV mode at all. My point was, and is, that there is little or no cost to the energy regenerated by the Prius.