The AstroPad is an intriguing idea as a go around option over the Cintiq for a cheaper alternative. However, the flaw is that it has to stay tethered to the Mac or laptop for it to work effectively to work on programs like Photoshop, Illustrator, etc. The advantage may be that the price point of the iPad Pro with Astropad may be attractive for those who want something over the Cintiq. But, the Apple Pencil is an insult to the creative profession where you have to keep charging it to have it work for 30 minutes and then re-do it again.
On the other hand, my old school Intuos 4 really gets the job done and the stylus never fails me without a need to charge. I think the Intuos is one of the things Wacom has done a good job with and I find them solid and stable to use.
Although, with Astropad and iPad Pro, one of the major problems is that if you wanted to take the real work with you on the go outside of your studio or office to the cafe, there is no way in hell you can "take" a full desktop class app like Photoshop to work with native files with layers into an iOS environment. This is why I think the Surface Pro has a big advantage on that as a hybrid device, something that iPad Pro should have been exclusively.
One could use a Mac laptop and a tablet but that would be cumbersome. I used to do that years ago and it was a pain in the ass if one were to set that up in a place like a coffeehouse or anywhere out of the studio.
I don't necessarily agree with Linda Dong's views as they're premature. I've never used a Cintiq but have seen a smaller model in the wild once. It's not a bad device and has some good accuracy with the stylus. Of course, it does have some drawbacks due to the limited OS compared to Surface Pro which has more flexibility.