Background: I started out with Real3D and Imagine on the Amiga, Moved on to PoV/Moray and various Public Domain modellers/renderers, before getting 3D Studio 4 for the PC - For hobbiest use at first, but have had voluntary opportunities to work in broadcast graphics creating intros, stings & credit rolls for a local TV station, recently moving on to creating static meshes for various game engines (Papyrus's GPL/Nascar sims & Unreal Engine)
I'm a 3DS Max person through and through, mainly because of my own investment in time with the interface, I've tried Lightwave briefly (hated the UI) and have resisted moving to / trying Maya for the same reason, i.e. being worried that it would literally take me a decade to get the same kind of level of experience / use out of them.
I'm aware of some of 3D Studio's weaknesses, however I have found many plugins over the years to extend and compensate. Texporter & Chilliskinner to make up for it's poor UV handling and Laszlo Sebo's awesome Meshtools to expand Max's modelling capabilites - a set of modeling tools that make low-poly work a breeze. (Designed to facilitate a method known as "Box Modelling" - whereby you start with a simple primitive and use subdivision, face extraction, face scaling & vertex editing & more to create more complex models from a minimal start, rather than trying to lower the polycount of a higher resolution model.)