I want to make some charachters with equipment and animation

I want to create some characters with equipment and animation clips.

I want to make a character where the different parts of his body are spread out in a hierarchy. Then I want to make equipment in a hierarchy too.

The idea behind the hierarchy of the character is so I can apply different materials to each item in the hierarchy. The individual pieces of equipment will also be in hierarchy for the same reason.

The idea is so that I can program the character to animate and display different equipment.

I want to do the modeling and hierarcy in Rhino and then materials and animation in blender and transfer it over to either unity or gamemaker or unreal.

Why not model in Blender? Then your Hierarchy for materials and rig can be built as you go? There are some great tutorials on CGCookie for modeling and sculpting in blender.

Because nurbs is easier for me than polygons.