Typical, after hours of messing around I post this and then figure it out myself. Not entirely sure why but resetting the objects Xform helped. Now 3dsmax is seeing them at their correct sizes. Well, I guess I'll leave this here in case anyone else runs into this problem!
definitely Google Sketchup :) It is the most intuitive and fastest modeling program I have ever used. While I am mainly using 3dsmax and MODO for complex box modeling tasks, blocking in bigger scenes, or buildings like yours, goes much much faster in sketchup.
Skylight can do this in Max. There are probably other ways too. http://docs.autodesk.com/3DSMAX/15/ENU/3ds-Max-Help/index.html?url=files/GUID-772D28D6-41C3-4C80-80AD-3774726E208F.htm,topicNumber=d30e340999,hash=GUID-353CD88E-17D9-4240-8B1F-40CBDC8968B6
in case you are using 3dsMax, there might be some tricks and tips in here: http://www.youtube.com/user/renderhjs#g/c/9E2B5F03E0264773 using: http://renderhjs.net/textools/ also look at the documentation there of each tool as it shows with a single animation what you can do with each tool.
Would it be possible to share some of your work ? I am currently learning MODO for similar purposes and could use some inspiration. I am definitely interested in the Indie Package but without the inclusion of MeshFusion there wouldn't be incentive enough for me to move from 3DSMax to MODO.
http://docs.autodesk.com/3DSMAX/13/ENU/Autodesk%203ds%20Max%202011%20Help/index.html?url=./files/WS73099cc142f487553b93539f117a2602bd5-6043.htm,topicNumber=d0e371172 i dont think that these forums have the sole purpose to reiterate answers you can get from the actual software documentation.
Also if I remember well back from the UT2k7 pillar thread UE3 actually uses the default 3dsmax rendered normals as an input. You're safe! You can try to load them along with your object in the Roboblitz editor if you really want to be sure. Yay!
Only advice I've got is to just stick with it. I tried learning Maya and had it within 4 hours. In fact, I find that a lot about Maya is easier than 3dsmax, especially not having to use modifiers. Who knows, maybe you'll find that liberating too.
Thx for the replies guys. @rooster: i know the hands are shit, i intended to fix them in zbrush, but maybe i´ll do it in 3dsmax before. @Emil: Thx for the great paintover, will definetly look into that, the shoulderpart was more then obvious(why didn´t i see that myself?)
It could be that the 3dsmax>XSI>Marmoset process is preserving the split vertex normals from Max. But the straight XSI>Marmoset is not preserving any split vertex normals from XSI. Did you split the normals in XSI? I don't use XSI, sorry, not sure what the terms are there.