[Scythels]

 

Add to that when lens testers and customers alike are running back and forth, pulling their hair out returning decentered out of spec lenses

This applies more to young mirrorless players than DSLR users.  Canon and Nikon have... decades of experience building AF and IS lenses and have tight tolerances - according to roger @ LR only 2-3% of lenses from each of them are sent back as duds. 

 

As far as copy-to-copy variance when out of spec lenses are removed, canon varies ~7% and sigma varies over twice as much at ~13%.  They absolutely are not beating canikon at tolerance levels, and Zeiss is even better than those two. 

 

 

'm not sure it is fair to compare to the otus because that lens is true APO

 

1. Apochromatism simply means the lens brings three wavelengths of light into equal focus, it does not mean there is no CA, it doesn't mean the lens is ultra super duper sharp... it only means three wavelengths are brought into equal focus (Achromatic is the same with two wavelengths).  Apochromats tend to have almost no CA, while being very sharp, but that is not inherent.
   
2. A lens' status as achromatic or apochromatic does not mean it can't be compared to others.  Should we not compare the 135/2 aposonnar to the 135L and 135DC just because it's apo?
   

 

aybe not that much because the 125f2.5 was also APO and it was very inexpensive.

Making an apo telephoto is simpler than making an apo distagon lens.  The balance between crown and flint elements will bring a lens into near-apo status inherently if low dispersion elements are used.  Making it APO is a lesser degree of "extra correction" when compared to a distagon-type lens.

 

 

Anyways I think the OTUS has better bokeh and a few other pluses over this lens; but that does not mean that i think it is worth 5x? the price.

Only you can justify your position on the price-performance curve, and you will pay exponentially more for the same performance gains the higher up you go.