Hi. Thomas.
Instead of switching you can try different 3d party solutions to improve the animation functions of max. The new Character studio is a powerful addition.
Or Motionbuilder from Kaydara. One of the most powerful tools for character animation and in my mind EASIER to use than any other character animation solutions available.
And you can get a free 1 year licence of MB until July 1. The interchange between Max and MB works via fbx plugin. Visit 3dbuzz or Kaydara to get more information. It also works well with Maya.
Although I prefer Maya over Max in terms of character rigging and animation, it`s never easy to make a good rig or animation from scratch(cause you often need different rigs for different tasks, or fast rigs but with max control etc). Neither in Maya nor in any other comparable application(XSI, Max, Houdini, Lightwave, Cinema etc). And I think that good rigging needs a substantial knowledge of expressions/scripting.