Type 4 Liberty Caps
My advice: don’t even think about Sheldon varieties.
When you first learn about large cents, everything is about Sheldon varieties. How many varieties there are, how to attribute them, and how few people have actually managed to collect all 295 of them. As a warm-up, you might consider collecting just the 1794 Sheldon varieties until you realize there are 58 of them. Then you might start looking for the year with the fewest varieties at which point you’ll learn chain cents are very expensive, 1799s are unattainable, and 1805 just doesn’t really interest you.
It’s at this point you might wander to PCGS to see what other possibilities there are when you’ll discover something similar - 1793 has 3 very expensive cents you need to get through to even begin thinking about a type set.
Then you’ll give up and go buy some nice capped bust half dollars.
But wait! There’s a way to feel a sense of accomplishment and completion without losing the thrill of the chase.
A date set of Type 4 Liberty Caps. Liberty caps are downright charming. The dies were hand engraved, they were designed by Joseph Wright who died in the Yellow Fever epidemic of 1793, and they look great. Start with Type 4 because the Type 3, while necessary to make a complete dated set of Liberty Caps, can cost a multiple of the other 3 combined.
1794 - There are five types within 1794, but we’re only interested in two of these for the first set: the head of 1794 and head of 1795. These are exactly how they sound. The first type has a head that looks most like that used in 1793 (the pricey “head of 1793), the second has the head only used in 1794, and the head of 1795 extended into 1795. XF will give you the most detail for your buck and should be found easily for less than $5,000.
1795 - While there are also 5 types in 1795, only one is really accessible. With half a million minted, an XF can be had for less than $4,000.
1796 - 1796 is the easiest because there’s only one type, but it’s also has a mintage of just over 100,000 making it the rarest of the 3. To stay in the XF range, you may have to jump up to $8-9,000, or as much as the prior two coins combined. Dropping the grade to VF20 would make it the least expensive of the bunch at less than $3,000.