i noticed there is an export option for Q3 .maps in blender. is there an import for them also?
The export .map for Blender sucks really, everything is dis-positioned. Don't really bother with it. Instead, try exporting to .ase and importing with the misc_model entity.
I haven't heard of a direct .map import, though I know you can decompile a bsp into an .ase, which you could then import into Blender.