Well... they are different products. The Core, is a "state of the art " effort, by a leading company, and the price reflects that. In that I already have more guitars than I know how to play, I'd go Core . But I was also one of those "Buy Amurrican" guys (
in guitars at least ) as my cars are Toyota & Subaru . The leading guitar firms are American and reserve their best efforts for their domestic factories . So by design and intent. the US stuff is "better".
But also waay more expensive, and not necessarily as cost effective. I simply cannot afford Core. I'm not going to spend $4,000.00 on a guitar. Thankfully , PRS makes the "S2" line, which competes with domestic made models made by the rest of the market (Fender, G&L, Gibson and whoever else I'm missing ) So I can , within reason still buy an American PRS guitar (I did, an S2 Mc Carty).
But a far as bargains go ... the SE stuff is almost without peer. Phil Mc Knight shows that in one of his blogs, that one could buy 5 excellent SE and S2 guitars, for the price of one killer Core !
If I had no instruments, that is clearly the way I would go.. I for one, could probably never make a Core sound as good as it can. Or even a good SE. So the qualitative differences are meaningless as far as my ability to extract them from the superior instrument. I'm gonna sound bad, regardless of the instrument !
The only real reason I bought a $1500 S2 over a $1500 SE .was simply due to neck carve and scale length. Without having either instrument to fondle prior to the buy, I went S2 as it is shorter scale, and smaller neck carve.
In that I have the S2, and have "fondled" the Wide Fat SE... I'm copping the SE next (Hollowbody II). I do not regret my choice. I made the best decision I could at the time.
But it is clear, that the $1500 SE ... represents the better "value" ... because if it were MIM (
Made In Maryland ) ... the sucker would cost more than twice as much !