MD4

I''m not talking about checksumming, I''m talking about the Quake 3 model format. I wanna add objects (as in people, animals, monsters, etc) to my landscape engine. My OpenGL Game Programming book sitting here goes into MD2 models, but I decided since Quake 2 is so old that going ahead and getting Quake 3 models to work would be better. I thought MD3 models supported skeletal animation, which is always good, right? But then I discovered MD3 is still regular vertex animation. But then I find out that there is this MD4 format that DOES do skeletal animation. But alas, I can''t find any MD4 models to load! If MD4 does skeletal animation, and skeletal animation is so great, why are there no models out there in that format? I don''t want to be stuck in the past; I want the bleeding edge! On the side, is skeletal animation any harder or easier to implement than vertex animation? Is it easier to get fun effects with skeletal animation (bodies flying through the air, smashing into walls, falling down stairs, other Havok stuntman style stuff)?