my favorite is aseprite because its easy, has nice tools.
my least favorite is paint.net, probably because its one of the only other sprite editors i've ever use
i used piskel for pixel art before for a while, then i switched to paint.net, for a long time i made my art on .net and then, then i got aseprite, . now i use aseprite so much whenever i do any stuff on paint.net or piskel it just seems so strange and hard to do stuff (even though i had previously mastered both programs)
ive not used gimp before but i think its better suited for high res textures, like making a grass texture seamless and stuff.
also can we see some of your Artwork?
Cheers!
I honestly haven't done any original work in aseprite, mostly I use it to edit pre-made graphics -- stretch, resize, distort, etc. In a lot of games it's essential to have images with a partially transparent background and I don't think MS paint supports that.
The guy on itch.io that first recommended Aseprite to me is using it on his games. I've been pretty impressed with his animations.