Cinema 4D?
HoudiniFX?
MODO?
Maya?
So far, I’m leaning towards Cinema4D due to its rich animation, modeling, and physics features. All for a reasonable price in one package.
Autodesk products have the best support for FBX but it’s not a great situation to get into being stuck with one of those. If you have a workflow for C4D then I’d stick with that. Modo has some great modeling tools and has been adding updates more specifically to support exporting to game engines so that’s not a bad choice either.
You left out Blender, Zbrush,3d coats, and 3ds Max.
I use Maya LT, and Blender. Cinema 4d is too expensive, and licensing looks too problematic…
I would take Blender as #1. Though I use maya a bit more right now.
Blender is still the best. I may just cancel maya, and make decision to only use blender.
I’m on the fence for 3d coats.
Isn’t Maya LT heavily crippled, especially in the animation and 3D modeling department?
MODO was the first one I considered, but its animation features are the weakest of the bunch.
C4D supports FBX natively.
Other programs like 3D Coat or Zbrush are for polishing later on, I’m talking about core tool-set.
Maya LT is perfect for asset creation for a game engine…but, it doesn’t have a built in rendering…(why need, you have Unreal) nor can you add additional python components. Check out their web site…
Also, check out Houdini…they have made great progress in terms of 3d asset creation with h16 and they have a GREAT plugin for Unreal… if you do procedural level building, H16 should be considered.
teak
As already stated in another thread: I am very pleased with the Modo Unreal Live bridge
(which is a Modo core feature. Not just an add-on or plugin of some sorts…)
Yes, MODO seems to be great(est) for a lot of things, but animations is not one of them.
Ideally, MODO+Maya would be the perfect combo, but that’s 2 software packages.
I would say Blender, it’s good, free and has a really fast update cycle (and the updates are free too). I guess the updates are a bit slower now since the main development is being done on the new 2.8 version which will have a realtime PBR viewport among other things.
Maya LT is crippled with some things. It’s extremely productive at some things. It has export to unreal function. Autodesk owns FBX format, natively.
Mostly my problem is with subscriptions. Either I own something, or I don’t. $30 a month for Maya isn’t too bad, but if I look at that over the next 5 years than it is.
It’s not the cost. It’s the idea, and hassle of a subscription.
A lot of the subscription based licensing in this industry has gotten out of hand, and now we have a lot more choices.
My choices are more for perpetual licenses. Then no worries whatsoever.
Animation wise. I’m looking into getting a mocap system like ipi mocap, ikinema orion, or ni mate with real sense. Then killing maya.
I don’t know too many people using C4D.
3Dcoats is perpetual license. Combined with blender, and affordable mocap. All less than one year of C4D.
The only thing C4D impresses me with is hair module. For the price. They can keep it.
Which you can get in a nifty package 
http://store.steampowered.com/sub/91036/
EDIT: Hah 
Misread your post… Read Mari not Maya 
You mean mastering it?
I think I’ll do some animations and models in Maya first, I have the academic licence for it anyway.
It will probably be more than enough for both superb animations and models, and textures.
Plus the World Machine.
No just dropping it completely. You’ll have the full version of Maya which is pretty good. Aside from it’s normal nuances.
Youll also have unlimited animation layers, nfur, and fx, and all of the extras. Non commercially.
I’m in love with the Houdini Apprentice right now but i’m having issues for exporting animations to UE4 and retargeting animations inside Houdini.
It’s autorig system for bipeds is really nice, the modelling workflow for creating procedural stuff is awesome (modelling from zero is not so great, but i saw a nice plugin for working with booleans that’s is called flux), the FX are really easy to achieve inside Houdini and there’s a nice course about Houdini for Games in pluralsight.
I’ve been to there site a few times over the years, and never seen this. I kind of wrote them off when they were bought out.
This is a really good deal. Does indie version support animation layers, blending, combining, or sequencer?
Yes, I intend to use this combo, when all is said and done:
Animation and rigging – Maya
Texture creation – Photoshop
3D modeling/sculpting/texturing/painting – 3D Coat
Terrain generation – World Machine
Assets – Megascans and various stores like Unreal Marketplace
Procedurals and FX - Houdini
That pretty much covers everything, outside a few plugins here and there.
Yes. No restrictions in that area.
Modo 10? Isn’t Modo 11 out? Those steam reviews were pretty brutal.
Yeah. 11.1 is out 
Yeah, but if Modo 11 is out where is Modo Indie 11?
Might take a while to trickle to the appropriate branch (which gets then valve approved)…