Sad I thought the OP was going to update it to be objective and instead simply threw in even more confusing edge cases.
PPLNS don't punish intermittent miners.
PPLNS miners will receive same value per share in long run regardless of how they mine.
The "guide" is now not something link worth (when noob asks for info on pools) and instead just another worthless personal "belief" based on superstition and half truths.
Sad because the OP spent a large amount of time and was articulate but it was wasted because he couldn't get away from personal biases.
If you have taken the time to go back and check whether I have updated the guide to be objective, you should have at least read it carefully enough to notice that I have taken out PPLNS from the sentence about reward methods punishing intermittent miners. Please get your facts right before calling something worthless.
And yes, there are personal biases - I have mentioned before that this guide is based on my personal experience with different pools, with an aim to make it easy to find a comfort zone for the newcomer.
And please let off with the "Same Value in the Long Term" argument. While perfectly valid in statistical terms, it has little relevance to the intermittent miner since it's far more important to know how much reward he/she can expect to earn for a given period of mining.