I'm a Core and PS customer, I have no dog in this hunt.
I'm a musician and buy them to make my livelihood. I value tone first, playability a close second. and appearance dead last. I'll nitpick tone and playability, and probably not nitpick whether there's a finish flaw somewhere.
Though I do love pretty guitars, I'd never keep one around unless it met my first two values in a way I prefer. I can only speak for myself when it comes to my preferences and the characteristics of an instrument I value.
When it comes to sounds you
prefer to hear, and feels you
prefer to feel, well, those preferences can't be anything but entirely subjective.
Sure, you can measure frequencies, and measure the parts of the guitar. Those things are objective.
But you can't measure, "I like the tone of this one better." That's purely subjective. So's "This feels really great to me."
Moreover, because no two of us are exactly alike, the choice of musical instrument we choose to express ourselves with
should be intensely personal and subjective - like the art form.
Creating music is, after all, an art form that is intensely related to our brains, ears, and hands, and choices we make when we create music are about as subjective as it gets.
To which I say, "Good, that's as it should be."
So what makes an instrument 'better' when we all do different things with an instrument and value an instrument's characteristics in different ways?
Nothing. There's no such thing as better. There's only what's better for you.
If you want to set up criteria relating to how the guitars look, or fit and finish, it's easy to find one of either type that's flawless and beautiful. Pick your poison. There are plenty of complaints on the forum not only about SEs, but about all the models. Everyone has a gripe about
something.
If the criteria are how they feel, the S2s feel more like my Core models. Makes sense. They're made of the same woods dried out the way PRS does it in the factory, in the same building, with the same machinery, and the team is headed up by the same people - the people who set the bar.
If it's a matter of tone quality, I hear more of a Core sonic vibe in the S2. Thus, they're my preference when comparing them.
I think S2 would be as good as Core guitars - given my preferences - with the US hardware and electronics. I don't feel that way about the SEs. Not that the SEs are bad. They're just different.
But like I said, I'm not an S2 or SE customer, I've always bought Core and up, because why wouldn't I if I can?