Do any of your tools use long options (prefixed with a double dash)? If so, make sure you disable the "smart" extension, otherwise you might end up with en dashes.
Maybe he edited his post, but it now ends with "... Let's just say I get a bit lost when it isn't available. " suggesting that he actually does use pandoc for stated tasks.
It sounded like a rhetorical question, and based on the context that you use it for a lot of things, I sensed a bit on excitement there too, and thus the exclamation.. like "Isn't that awesome‽".