I figured out why the vmf prop importer was taking so long. Never made a prop library for the map. Anyways, now when I export as fbx, everything works great, except for the imported props. Brushes and displacements and stuff export textures fine, but the imported props come out with no texture. Is there a fix for this?
Can you explain specifically what you are talking about. If the imported props have no textures, then it's only logical that exporting them won't have any. I'm a little confused on what you are doing. Are you having a problem with the FBX just in an external app?
The prop materials look great in 3ds max. Then if I export as fbx and open in 3ds max or blender (so it is not program specific) the brushes and overlays import fine, but the props have no materials assigned.
That's really odd. When exporting to FBX, there really shouldn't be any difference between a brush and a model inside the exported file. The only thing I can think of is that when using a prop library, the models are XRef Objects in the scene. I have seen a warning before when exporting to FBX when XRef's objects/scenes are present, but I never paid attention as it didn't effect the specific objects I selected/exported.
I'd submit a feature request to Autodesk (http://3dsmaxfeedback.autodesk.com/forums/80695-general-feature-requests).
In current scenes, you can try Opening the Xref Scene and XRef Object dialogs and merge all XRef files into the current file. Then re-export. Those Dialogs are located under File > References > (XRef Scenes | XRef Objects). For more info, just go to the Max docs on XRef Scenes (http://help.autodesk.com/view/3DSMAX/2015/ENU/index.html?guid=GUID-AD995B82-D069-4C96-A3DF-D9FE8C8A284A) and XRef Objects (http://help.autodesk.com/view/3DSMAX/2015/ENU/index.html?guid=GUID-AEDE75F6-F3CB-497B-A2CC-3B0DC521061F).
Note: If it's just the Materials that fails, you can browse the XRef Object list for just the Materials and merge the materials. That would be my first step.
Hopefully that helps.
Ok. Brushes and overlays also have a texturing issue, where uvs get messed up a bit, but from what I've heard it is just a fbx issue in 2015 sp 3 which sadly I have.
Yes, the FBX exporter in 2015 is broken. You can go moan about it here: http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/3ds-max-3ds-max-design-general/new-sp3-fbx-export-bug/td-p/5448593 I did :)
Best thing is to submit a bug report to Autodesk.
only issue is that I got the same uv errors with the 2016 free trial. Going to keep experimenting with it.
Once I ran into the memory leak in 2016, I haven't used it much. When SP2 comes out I'll likely utilize the FBX exporter in it to test it.
If FBX exporter in 2015 is broken, good chance it is broken in 2016 too. I have also had the memory leak Shawn mentioned, would advise staying with 2015 is you can... and if you are trying different versions FBS export I would suggest going back and not forward, try 2014 or 13 maybe.