How good are the max and maya converters?

#1 Its good I've used it my self in max exported a model with textures and loaded it into the show tool and everything showed up just fine. Did not test the animation but theres a tutorial that will show you how to animate it in max so it will work just fine. This is why i'm using Torque because everything else would not export correctly to other game engines.

#2 The exporters themselves, when used correctly for a model work very well.

Historically, the problems people have is when they don't fully understand the nodes and hierarchy Torque (via the converters) expect, and get very unusual results.

The concept of blended animations is one that tends to be a sticking point for some artists that aren't used to the way Torque does animations as well.

#3 @Stephen

Great comment. One thing that I would like to add what you said though too is that 99% of the time the issues that people have with the exporter comes from ther users or lack of understanding and knowledge of the 3D application that they are using.

The exporters are insanely power, yet also simple in a brute force sort of way which allows them to be highly adapable with pretty much every change that has come into our 3D applications over the past 6 years!