drealmer7: The M&M series recently became of interest to me. I had always been "eh" about both the HoMM and M&M games because I wasn't sure if the gameplay types were up my alley and they seemed a bit intimidating as far as learning and being able to get in to since I came to them long after their releases (I remember some of them in the store back in the day, but, they seemed overwhelming in my younger gaming days.) After many many years of indifference and uncertainty, I've crossed the line (a couple months ago?) to "yeah, I want to play some of those some day." Of course, I have no idea where to begin, what I will like best (I'm pretty sure I'll like M&M more than HoMM because of gameplay, I'm more into RPGs than TBS, in general, but I'm still not sure), if I should strart at the very beginning or WHERE to start or, or, or, I don't know what to do. I figure someday I'll figure it all out and acquire something to get me started into it all.
HOMM really isn't that hard to pick up. Easy enough to learn the basics and if you don't plan to crush the difficult modes it's still a challenge with some room to make mistakes.
I'd probably guess #3 - best combo of simplicity and UI. It's arguably also the best game of the series.
M&M...on the other hand....that's trickier. To jump into the early games you'd really need to read the manual or google play tips even to get started. mm6 is often regarded as the best, and probably the most worth the investment of learning how to play if you were only going to try one.