If you must maintain vertex order, the only way to do this properly is via a script that will re-create the entire mesh with proper vertex order. It would be very slow and a big pain, but would do the job.
Precise vertex order, as in left-to-right first-to-last, is going to be difficult. If you want that, create all the verts by hand and then create the faces for them. Or you could try exporting to OBJ and editing that in a text editor, yuck. There are some scripts for showing the vertex numbers in the viewport. Max 2008 has…