is it possible to make it so when you spawn the team drops down in pods or a carrier or a vehicle of some sort and jumps out onto the battlefield?

Not 100% sure but I think you can animate a carrier vehicle prop, then set up the LUA to call on that animation only on spawn, even then it wouldn't be every time you spawn, for a final touch it might be possible if you put the spawn nodes higher from the ground, never tried it to see if you "fall" like you would normally do or you are frozen until the unit touches the ground...

hmm sounds like this could be hard...

I don't know about hard, but I wouldn't recommend any first-time mappers try it.