i think you're both right.  i have some great V4 textures.  still, i don't think they're actually better than my V3 textures.  most are not as good.  a few more come with specular and bump, but since all of the textures i have just use the base texture desaturated with a few tweaks for those, it's really easy to duplicate the improvement with shaders.

as far as i can see, texture making is the same as it ever was, and more seams in V4 has just meant more use of either 3d paint tools and merchant resources.  3d paint tools are great, but they encourage painting from photos, which means problematic textures with specular, bump, and SSS burned in.  they look great in really ambient lighting or lighting similar to the source photo, but not so much in directional and original lighting.  there's a reason just about every 3d texture tutorial i've found over at CG society advocates painting from scratch (and painting photoreal quality).

on the other hand, people have learned tons about shaders. understanding of both Poser and D|S materials has advanced.  that's independent of mapping, but i've also seen mapping tools and techniques advance.  while the textures may be of the same quality, mapping isn't.  personally, i can't really judge mapping quality.  from what i've watched in this thread, i'd say that consistent scale and lack of distortion are key aspects, at least as key as sensible seams.  so i think the mapping advances added to Antonia are pretty important. 

that said, i'm not sure i'll dare trying to make a texture for those mappings because of how difficult her seams are, and the huge scale variations in places that, imvho, need to have the same level and size of detail.  i've been studying photos a lot for a while, and have started teaching myself to make textures.  as far as i can tell, the most important aspect of skin mapping on a young woman's skin is bump and displacement, because most young people have a very even skin tone (outside of freckles).  it's mainly the bump that's everywhere  that provides the necessary detail.  that means detail level needs to be as consistent and comprehensive as possible, because skin always has some texture. i'd appreciate being able to work with the V3 mapping, myself.