Stainless is just a piece of metal. Indestructible. No rules. Requires some skill to avoid food sticking, but it is doable. You can cook anything, anyhow and clean it however you want.

Non-stick is... well, non-stick, but there's a ton on rules. No metal, no dishwasher, no stacking, ... However they are really non-stick, no skill required.

Cast iron is like a middle ground. You cannot ruin the pan, but you can easily ruin the coating: no wine, no tomato, no lemon, no soap, no dishwasher, etc. And the non-stick effect is weaker than Teflon or ceramic, it still requires skill to use.

As a hobby cook I have never gotten into cast iron, I use 90% stainless steel and 10% non stick (mainly for pancakes) and for my wife who doesn't want to fiddle with temperatures with stainless.

I have Lodge cast iron and De Buyer carbon steel and I definitely prefer the carbon steel. I do have non stick for things like eggs or pancakes but they don't last forever, I get a few years of use. I recently replaced my old Tfal PTFE with Blue Diamond and I'm quite happy with them.

No one with a cast iron pan would ask this question

I lack the subtlety to tell you if my cast iron pan cooks better or makes anything taste better, but I can assure you it regularly survives abuse that would ruin a Teflon pan in days.

Non stick: alright for eggs and other relatively low temperature stuff. Make sure you only use rubber, plastic, or other soft utensils, and never clean it with a scraper or steel wool. The surface of the non stick is fine as far as I know, but if you go deeper by getting too hot or scraping with something too hard, you can expose the toxic chemicals.

Stainless: my go to. Use whatever utensils you want, and clean it however you want. The main thing to make it non stick is heat the pan up hot enough that when you splash a bit of water on it, it beads up and scatters. Then use plenty of oil. The main downside is you usually can't put them in the oven.

Cast iron: better in use than stainless, but harder to clean. Upside is you can use whatever with them, and you can swap between oven and stove. Downside is you can't clean them the same way as anything else.

The solution to all this mess is to buy good quality pans that meet your cooking needs and learn how to care for them, I have cast iron that belonged to my grandparents, I also have good nonstick pans,stainless pans and carbon steel they all have their uses. But if someone just wants a pan and doesn't cook alot I would go with carbon steel, it's more expensive, but you will probably only buy it once, (Vimes boots)and it does most thing well enough.

I recently watched a video on the topic of which pans you need, and the only two that were mentioned as important are non-stick and stainless steel

realistically, whichever one your most experienced with (and your cooktops are made for) is best

they're all basically the same, the issue is when recipes/directions assume one type of cook setup and the cook doesn't know any better

They're all fine with some extendent. It really depends specifically what and how you're cooking. I like cast iron for steak because you can heat it up a helluva lot, even without fat, while trying that with non-stick pans can damage the coating and make some weird smells. Similarly, I prefer it for frying eggs because I like to use a metal slice to flip eggs, and worry about scarcjing my non-stick. But I have both and happily use both.

Nah, honestly, any more than you need to backwards breathe to enjoy wine

This is not religion. If you don't belong to my exact sect of christianity you are going to hell. However if you use a differet pan than me or even have a mix there is nothing wrong with it. So get and have a mix and learn what each does well / poorly.

i won't fry an egg on anything other than non-stick. I won't sear a steak in that, or my stainless (my stove takes too long to get my thick stainless to temperature - ymmv with different pans or a better stove), so cast iron it is. Most of my cooking is in cast iron because it is cheap and versital, but I use my stainless often enough that I'm keeping them.

I think that it is a joy to cook with my cast iron pans, but there is a number of caveats that other repliers already mentioned.

One of the points that I did not read yet, is that if you have really acidic foods, your cast iron seasoning will wear out fast. For those use cases, I stick (hehe) with ceramic pans.

Better at what? Most certainly better at splitting someone's skull open if they're in your home without an invitation. Hands down.

No.