I bought Hearts of Iron 3 quite a while ago and I can never summon the energy and motivation to play it. It's highly unlikely I'll ever finish a campaign in that game, it just doesn't activate my "gaming = must be instantly fun and rewarding" center.
Surely this is a great game but learning should be fun. In this game, the fun probably comes -after- one has learned it properly. Not sure when that is.

I have yet to be convinced that the original games are well written; I've played very little of them, but the few text that I saw was neither bad, nor exceptionally good. It consisted of very short paragraphs with quite simple descriptions of what's happening, and what was happening was standard oldschool D&D fare. Of course, telling a story with simple sentences and short paragraphs can be an art in itself, and who knows, maybe the stories will take interesting turns later on.

As for module recommendations, I'll refer you to this post for now, but feel free to ask for more specific suggestions once you're ready to actually play them. :)

Excellent! Thank you! Prepare to hear from me in no less than 5 years at the pace I play games. (: (probably an exaggeration!)

Bookmarked your link too.

Can anyone else give some feedback to the writing quality of the all 3 collections, most interestedly to me the 2nd?

Any Paradox Studios games that I have not tried yet, especially earlier tittles. I love the format of the games and the historic background, but they are just known for being very complex with steep learning curve. I know that as a fact when I learned some of the games (mainly EU series and the latest CK) as well. Basically at the end I keep returning to the ones I'm more familiar with (EU series).

Some lengthy RPG like Baldur's Gate, Witcher, Ultima series etc. I love RPGs, and I admire these games with deep story, but I don't have the time to really focus on these games to follow the story. Instead, I enjoy RPG emphasizing less on story but more on gameplay and exploration, like Might and Magic, TES.