Importer/exporter

1st: i m no 3d wiz, so take my answer for 51% at best:

I think you will have to get Milkshape 3d
cause i think this will be the only 3d prog, 4 which you can get exporters for Freelancer file format.
There should be a shareware / 30 days test version.
There should also be a bunch of importers for Milkshape.

Now find a file format which
– gmax will export
– milkshape will import
(maybe 3ds?)

Import your stuff to Milkshape
and export it to Freelancer CMP / MAT format.

Take care about the export settings for size “Scale Down” (try value “1”) and
the orientation, so the exporter will flip it upside down (usually).

The other thing you might want to take care of is the texture format.
Usually these will be in TGA or BMP format.
If you convert these to DDS format and assign the dds-files to the material in Milkshape,
you should get significant smaller model files (MAT - or CMP if texture included there) after exporting your stuff.

Voila
(maybe)

Maybe you find something, both progs can work with
at that place:
http://www.davidhsmith.net/Essential_Tools.htm