@darkraptor777 I'm pleased with the fact that we were able to have a genuine, gentleman-like conversation about this. I understand that being criticised is not a fun experience, but you handled it well. While we may not see eye to eye, we definitely got to one another which is excactly what I had hopes of doing in my original comment. I'll be sending a friend request your way, perhaps we can even play sometime. Keep working at it and hopefully I'll talk to you soon.

TL;DR: OP was not a f-a-g today.

While I find your lack of interest in my tier aims disappointing, I can understand wanting something like a hyper beast over a more simple skin. But economics dictates that there have to be things of greater value and things of lesser value, and there is plenty of amazing work on the workshop to take that greater value position. That and I do not regard myself as an incredibly skilled artist, hence I do not create things like the 'M4 basilisk'. My skill lies more in colour play than anything else, which is why I have a more heavy focus on it.

To be completely honest I am trying to get this collection out the door and done, the Tec-9 will be the final addition and then it's be out your mind as quick as it arrived. You will be (hopefully) glad to know I plan on revisting one of my old designs (AUG Frost Drake) to improve upon it. If all goes well I may do more in a similar style, but that remains to be seen. Hope to see you again around the workshop.

-darkraptor777

As for the case, this particular collection was in backlog before the case was annouced. While influencial on the order I released the skins I would still like to get them on the workshop. Cases will be released after the next one so it makes sense to still publish the skins since they have a better chance if they're on the workshop instead of my desktop.

I would agree these skins should not be of the 'Classified' tier. But the SSG 08 is not the only skin in the collection, so it's rather unfair of you to paint them all with the same brush. For example the Berettas and XM are in the collection and those guns reside in the cases blue tier (I also happen to think the Galil looks the nicest out of the lot and that the SSG is the worst).

Secondly, fair play, I can understand what I do not being considered 'variety' by some people. Although I think a better conversation would be whether variety is good or bad (since I would argue any change is techincally variety).

In regards to the finish type, not all of them are gunsmith, some are patina but lets not get bogged down in that. I might be wrong but you seem to have implied that lower tier weapons should not use the gunsmith finish style. I would argue that the rariety of a weapon should be determined by it's overall quality and design and not the finish type. Therefore finish types should not be exclusive to certain 'tiers'.

@sliiCk hooray actual criticism :D (surprisingly rare). Although I am a bit bitter about my variety crutch being taken away. Also I appreciate the fact that you took the time to actually explain yourself, it helps alot when I have a more in depth understanding of what someone didn't like (although that is 1 out of millions who play cs:go).

The original idea which resulted in the collection was to provide a wide variety of birght and distinctive colours. That's why there's red, blue, yellow etc. It was the marbled and basalt styles which were added onto this original concept as I couldn't decide which suited it better. So I decided that the workshop community should choose (unfortunately that tripled the amount of content (which in hindsight was not the best plan)). I admit I tend to take a 'throw lots of things and see what sticks' approach to the workshop.

I certainly hope that I can appreciate some of your future works as well, but if you only put out works like this with the crutch of "but they're blue tier only", then I can assure you, that I will not. Instead of putting out 60+ of the same skin in a different color, take your time and put out 1 or 2 higher quality skins with a greater level of work involved. That's what I'd like to see.

I'm sorry if you felt like I was attacking you. I'm just sharing my thoughts and opinions with you and those who read these comments. I'm not trying to be overly negative, just trying to improve the quality of the submissions that the workshop sees because I genuinely want better quality.

-sliiCk

I also understand that you may be aiming at a lower tier, but your work has been tagged under the new "gunsmith" paintstyle for the upcoming case. That's my problem with this. If these were just random submissions, I'd be fine with it. But considering that in the new case, the SSG 08 is "Classified", that definitely warrants a much more beautiful work (I honestly only saw one worthy under the "gunsmith" tag). Your works are flooding that small pool as it is and distracting from better skins, which is what provoked my original comment. I'm a big fan of the SSG 08 and would love to finally see some great looking skins for it instead of skins like this (skins like this and "Abyss" are the only ones in game, hence me saying that you're not being original).

This needs to be broken up into multiple comments because the max length for a comment is 1000 characters and I had tried to submit nearly 3 times that.

@darkraptor777 I wasn't "shouting" at anyone. I was simply stating my opinion while putting emphasis on the quality aspect of what I hope for out of new skins. Now, allow me to retort.

I would most certainly call your "Gemstone Collection" lazy. Let's be honest here. It's the same basic textures that you color swapped over and over again. I looked at all of the ones for SSG 08 and they're literally all the same, except for a different base color. You submitted the same skin over and over again. There's no originality in it and there certainly isn't anything interesting about it. Your concept of "large variety of choice" is humorous because there is NO variety - none, at all. How can you say that the same skin with a different base color is "variety"?

@sliiCk I would prefer it if your comment was constructive criticism, shouting at someone and telling them that the thing they made is bad isn't very helpful.

Also I wouldn't call it lazy, I'm just geeting the most out of what I have and also trying to provide the most possible options for you nice people to choose from when voting on the workshop. So the large variety of choice helps make sure the optimal skin gets in the game.

As for "QUALITY skins" the blue tier skins tend to be more plain and less flashy and/or detailed. The vast majority of my work is aimed at that tier since the workshop already has enough high detail skins and asiimov knock-offs.

I hope that you will find one of my future skins to your liking.

-darkraptor777

Not only are these not very aesthetically pleasing, they're lazy skins. All you did was create one original skin and modify the colors. I sincerely hope that those do not get accepted into the game, especially for the SSG 08. We need some QUALITY skins.