@ArtbyV - Maya still uses smoothing groups. It's just hardened vs. softened normals. After you create UVs, run this script. http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=52722&page=2
I figured they were similar, but I wasn't entirely sure (never used Max). I typically do the painstaking process of doing it by hand, but this script did a much better job than me and fixed a lot of issues. Thanks a bunch! Still having some issues though. I'll start a new thread. Don't want to threadjack here.