I tend to find that in pretty much all media, the fan favourites are rarely the most newcomer-friendly, and that only multiplies as you go deeper and deeper into message-boards and insular fan societies and so on and so forth. Connoisseurs tend to gravitate to the more challenging stuff.
We on this website, for instance, are pretty close to the top of Dream Theater's pyramid of nerdiness, and as our breadth tapers off to a fine point, so does Awake massively increase in popularity. Pretty much all albums tend to get re-evaluated, more often increasing in favour as time passes, but even within that, dear Papa Cronos tends to favour the dense, moody, "listen to this for two years and you might finally 'get' it" albums over the more vibrant caffeine shots. Poll Scarred versus Forsaken on DTF.org, for instance, and Scarred is likely to win by miles. Poll it on Last.FM, and the result is quite likely to
skew the other way.
An album like Origin of Symmetry, likewise. I went for years just liking a couple of tracks before it eventually caught me on a good day, and I went "Actually, this is pretty darned good." Heck, I saw Citizen Erased
live and it still didn't manage to squeeze a snifter of emotion out of me - just felt like another of those samey, meandering Origin songs. They might as well have been playing Space Dementia. (Which I also love now - funny how things change!)
I'd say I like Origin more than the Resistance nowadays, certainly did when I tried to rank them a few days ago, and the fanbase definitely does, but to get someone into the band? Wouldn't think it's the easiest sell. The Resistance is striking, it's immediate. It lashes, and crashes, and rolls. That kind of thing, while it wears off in the long run, is invaluable to a new fan. Once you're hooked, you'll be more persuaded to forgive the trickier stuff. More likely to keep coming back to the albums that might not always work straight off the bat. But I think it's very important that a starter album has, regardless of any depth or enduring quality or meticulously crafted atmosphere that swells up on repeated listens, lots and lots of surface character. If it has the other things, great, but a lot of fan favourites tend to include some tougher-skinned albums. From my own experience, I'd personally include Origin among those - but experiences do differ!
So, yes. To me, I'd say Origin vs. Resistance is like... Terria vs. Synchestra. Or like how I prefer Deadwing but I'd recommend a newcomer starts with In Absentia. Might not be a bad call, might be just what someone's looking for, but I wouldn't personally depend on it to leave an impression on a newbie.