Yeah, me to.
When done right, D2 has an unusual combination of high hardness, good corrosion resistance, relatively good toughness, good abrasion resistance and it cuts well due to the micro serration effect of the carbides. There are other steels that do some of these things better, but I've found none that do all of them like D2.
I find it holds up to my uses better than anything. Yesterday I was cutting drywall and fiberglass tape with it. I use it in the shop to deburr parts. I use it to skin deer. I use it in my steak knife (I think those large carbides and high hardness help with edge blunting on the porcelain) For the somewhat abusive things I subject blades to, D2 has got to be the best all around steel for me. In side by side comparisons with S30V and VG10, the D2 comes out on top in real world usage, for me.
A lot of people's problem with D2 is the large primary carbides, which can be up to 50 microns. And for people who don't really use their knives for much, and are mostly concerned with sharpenability, rust resistance and the ability to get very sharp, lower carbon stainless is better. But if you like your edge relatively hard and thin and plan to really work the heck out of it, there is none better than D2 and I think those large carbides are contributing to the cutting ability beyond what finer carbides would. When you look at images of knife edges taken under electron microscopes and see these big nasty carbides sticking out of the edge it makes you think, yuck, that ain't good. But you ever look at your own cuticle under high magnification? You'll say yuck, that ain't good, too. But the reality is, it is fine (well mine is, I can't speak for yours). I believe real world usage benefits from those large carbides. No knife will stay extremely sharp after much abusive use (cutting nails for example, there is going to be some dulling of the edge in any knife) but those fat carbides help the edge cut as if it were sharper than it really is, due to the sawing effect.
And when people find it hard to sharpen or that it takes a bad edge, somebody didn't do something right. There is nothing worse than thick, softly tempered D2. And nothing better than thin, hard D2.
Man, I'm running on aren't I... This was a thread about scale... It is Sunday morning, can this count as my religious experience for the day?
I'll part with this fun pict...
You always have interesting, constructive points backed up with fact
