You're being fed water from a fire hose, and I hate to contribute so little, but here goes:
All currently available DCC systems work....as they're designed to. They're all very reliable, and easy to learn if you're willing to make a few booboos and pick up the manual when you're stumped. Or call the manufacturer. I called them exactly once, maybe ten days into my first stab at DCC. Got the help I needed, and the manual provided the rest. I still resort to my Digitrax manual when I have to close the Ops Switch to rid the stack of addresses and start fresh. Takes three minutes. I think I did that 18 months ago or more, so it's not like I need to do it once a week.
All responses bear a second reading. They all have experience behind them.
You're a self-admitted introvert. I was for a long time, seem to have dropped all sorts of millstones from around my neck as I got older. Once I found I was adept at what helped people to admit me to their groups more readily, the rest was natural. Maybe it will go that way for you as well. Meanwhile, no clubs, no organizations for you...am I right? You hate talking on the phone...HATE IT! But it's better than dealing with people.
I tried the EZ-Command and realized my mistake very shortly. The volume on my BLI Hudson was so intense, and the quality of the resulting sound so bad, that I wanted immediately to alter the master volume. Nope, sorry. We don't do that with the EZ-Command.
Wut?
It went back and the nice fella at the LHS ordered me a Digitrax Super Empire Builder, a DT400 throttle, and I had to find a power supply (I hope that's changed). I have never looked back.
Fact is that not all decoders and not all drives work the same way. Even among the same make and model of locomotive there's differences in the way they work when they're assembled and leave the factory. So you have to be able to manipulate CVs so that the driving characteristics improve. That means anything but an EZ-Command....pretty much. It means figuring out what the decoder manual says you must do if you want better performance, and then having the patience to actually perform all the CV changes. Think the first version of the Soundtraxx Tsunami. It often has poor slow acceleration, as an example, but if you're willing to spend some time, you'll soon have any drive performing much more like a good toy locomotive should. Happened to me with a BLI DC version Class J 4-8-4 bought off eBay. It had a hitch in its giddap, but I fiddled with the higher numbered CVs dealing with motor control and darned if I didn't have that thing working like a caterpillar in about two minutes.
Spend between $250-400 and you'll have lots of power for all those locos you want to run, lots of currently active slots and addresses, and if you have a couple of throttles, each with two encoders on them, you'll have lots of control. But, I don't recommend running more than two locomotives at once unless you have them mu'd and they run as one unit.
You'll need about 4-6 amps if you're running any lights in cars, a signal or five, sensors/detectors, and several locomotives pulling 15-30 cars. It gets worse up grades. Keep that in mind.
Remember one thing: you can learn to love anyone. You don't 'find your soulmate' and end up marrying them. It just happens because you want to do it, and gosh...so do they! Works. It's the same with anything. If you're motivated, you'll learn to use and like any system from NCE, MRC, Roco, Lenz, CVP, EZ-DCC, Digitrax...the list must go on a bit. Just think a bit about what you need it to do, build in some future extra capacity (you must do this), and then pull the plug with your plastic when you have selected one or two good suitable sytems.
Read the $&*@ manual when you get it !!!
Good luck.
