I use postwork when needed, and when it suits my end goal.

At the same time, postwork takes time, effort, know-how and extra tools that not everyone has.
There are people whom like to show off, or push, their technical skills by showing off how much can be done with no postwork. 

If the goal if the image is to show off modeling and rendering technical skills, and one uses a lot of postwork, it can be considered cheating. Sort of like using a calculator on a math test that has a 'no calculators' constraint.

On a broader scheme of things, when the end goal is an image that tells a story, there's no reason why someone shouldn't use all the tools they have.

just my 2c :)

Hi, my namez: "NO, Bad Kitteh, NO!"  Whaz yurs?
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