If you plan on shrinking the final normal map by half, would you say a padding of 4pixels would be enough? I mean, what tyoe of padding "X" do you need from going large to small? Example 4096 to 2048 = 8 pixels? 2048 to 1024 = 4 pixels? 1024 to 512 = 2 pixels?
Yes, if you could give a description of what this "Skirt Filtering" feature does, I could tell you if Max8 has it or not. At a guess, it's probably similar to Max's "Edge Padding" setting, where the edges of the UV chunks are expanded outwards by an arbitrary number of pixels, to prevent seams showing when mip-mapping.…