Beauty is, of course, in the eye of the beholder. One man's stunner is another man's dog.
My first two tours 2002, and 2003, I was blown away by the girls, but even then, there was always the occasional night when it was slim picking, especially at Xmas, NYr's and Songkran, when Patong is swamped with farangs, many of them young and fit. After the tsunami, the quality really seemed to drop off, and maybe it has never quite got back to what it used to be.
I have always still felt that Patong has the best girls, but have never been to Pattaya. I rate BKK next, and Ko Samui last, where it seems the hardest to find a pretty girl. Even in BKK, I rarely saw a stunner among the BGs/FLs. The only stunners were in NEP at 3000 Bath LT, and non-working girls that you see on the streets, skytrain, restaurants, etc. Last tour, the best-looking girls I got were in BKK, but only because the times I settled for below the mark, I was very unhappy with the results. Some nights I did go home alone, but it paid off when finally I perservered and got hooked up LT with a couple of very attractive girls that I spent over 2 weeks each with.
So, for me, it really does matter what the girl looks like. But I don't look for stunners. Actually, I try to avoid stunners. I just look for pretty girls. I am very happy with a 7, and an 8 is great!! After 2 AM, when I've been drinking, and am horny, my standards do tend to drop very easily to 6, and on the rare occasion to 5. A 7 with a great personality is perfect for me. But a 5 is not going to make the cut for a 2nd date, even if she is Ms. Congeniality, and I usually try to avoid them even for the first date.
But the strangest phenomenon for me is the "under the skin" factor. Sometimes, if a girl is just a 6 or borderline 7, but has a way of getting to me, "getting under my skin," then something very strange can happen. Even though I know she is not that great-looking, for some reason she starts looking better and better to me. And it is not necessarily her great personality that makes her more attractive to me. In fact, the times it has happened were with girls who didn't really have such a great personality. Objectively, I know she is not particularly attractive, but I guess there is some kind of emotional/physical magnetism that sneaks up on me and catches me off guard. Once it happens, then it can be very hard to let her go, even though I am not in love with her at all.
Scary stuff.