Looking for Prop/Models Tips and Tricks(Mapping)

[Rel]

So ive been spending the last few hours just using props and mix and matching but some i noticed just tend to be a huge pain and not work well at all.

I was hoping i could get any help, ive read and watched everything on the wiki by the way. I wanna hear what people have to say, anything at all about prop usage would be incredibly helpful because im new to heavy prop based mapping, the only other i have used is spark for NS2 but that allows good brush usage.

Anyways onto what i mean.

One being the stone spiral stairs in the dungeon set, now i know mapping regardless for what game, takes a long time for detail to get it looking good but those stairs are a whole new level.

These, I cant find any prop to make it look anywhere decent and primitives are to simple for curves(at least to my knowledge)

Spoiler below!

Nothing looks good, nothing i can find works around them and using primitives in the editor is lackluster(i think im way to used to brush based)

Another thing is ive been finding amazing props, yet nothing looks good with them or work with them and the only alternitive is to just change prop sizes or overlap them into each other to even get close to a decent looking fit.

Heres what i mean. Look how out of place that looks but thats the best fit without looking horribly out of place(by that i mean using a whole different set) and the doorway corner has the prop inside of it and it just looks silly. Also in the 2nd Pic is another issue, a lot of things have leaks so things i dont even want seem to be necessary to try and lower them but it just looks out of place.

Spoiler below!

So far I do love the editor because of how amazing the script system is and the other tools that came along with it. Its not the devs fault by any means, they did give us there tools which is more to say than 99% of companies now a days.

Am i just being too picky and OCD or do others have issues like this, i would strongly appreciate any help or tips or anything for prop based mapping.

Ive had this mods story for months in the works but so far this designing is tedious so anything to ease that would be awesome.

Also i plan on adding a lot to the wiki about prop/plane and what goes with what and dimensions because id hate for others to feel this way.