I'm a newbie to these types of pen, but I tried this one ($75), the Vanishing point ($115), and the Lamy Safari ($30), and this one was my favorite. It's slim, so it's more comfortable in my hand, and it's less scratcy than the other two pens. It's got some heft to it, so it feels like a high quality pen. I'm a leftie, so it definitely smudges, but I haven't tried it with the smudge-free ink everyone keeps talking about. Ink flows smoothly as long as you're writing on a bunch of papers (say a notebook) rather than on a very hard surface.

If anyone else knows of any similar pens I could try, I'm up for it!