Yeah I hear you, I taught myself basic modeling and UV'ing with Maya for DICE, but it's not great. Both programs feel dated in interface, but Maya is just the worst in terms of UI. I feel it's missing a few key features (or makes them less accessible) that speed things up a lot for me in Max. Like no proper Edge…
Pior, in general I totally agree what what you said, especially about the tech guys forcing their preference down chain and especially for pure modeling. But there are some cases where there will be in house tools written that are specific to what that studio does and that the artist probably didn't have to do before being…