you went to the attribute editor to turn on backface culling?? click on the mesh, then go to display, then polygons, then backface culling..... it wont select anything it cant see
Here is a preview at one of the characters for a project I am working with a handful of friends. One 1024x1024 texture, 1,640 Polygons. Created in 3DSMax 2014 and CS6
Yeah, most 3d apps (and game engines too) have trouble sorting transparent polygons. Some fixes here: http://wiki.polycount.com/TransparencyMap#Sorting_Problems
Here is the proof of a Less than 100K polygons term: Total poly count: 76,988 ( on this, parts which belongs to the beast will be added...about 3k polys )
Charging by polygons is such a weird, arbitrary thing to do. I'd be able to make a decent 6k character much faster than a decent 2k character, for example.