This artpack contains a set of modular road sections that you place on the background of your choice to create a street or highway layout. Also contained are three pavement-only “maps” (depicting light, medium, and dark asphalt) suitable for creating vehicular arena layouts using Battleground‘s drawing tools. The artpack also contains tokens for pedestrians, vehicles, debris, and more to “populate” the roads and/or arenas with.
Here is a preview pic:
All the road sections in this artpack are homogeneous (i.e. created in the same style) and designed to tile with each other as seamlessly as possible.
Here’s another preview pic, this time showing how the arena pavement maps are meant to be used in conjunction with Battleground‘s built-in drawing tools and text labeling tools to create custom arena layouts. The pic shows just a small corner of a much larger arena, of course.
A lighter and a darker pavement color are also available, if you prefer them for counter “readability” (or just for variety).
The graphics in this artpack are all high-resolution (122 pixels per cell), so they won’t pixelate even at full zoom in BRPG/BGE. Note that this is not the usual tactical scale found in other Battlegrounds artpacks; instead, all artwork is designed to be used at a scale of around 15 feet per grid square, with the snap-to-grid feature disabled.
The artpack contains a total of 157 graphics*, broken down into the following categories:
Arenas (3)
Road Sections (7; including straight sections, curves, and intersections)
Pedestrians (9; most of them armed)
Motorcycles (14; including 3 with a sidecar)
Cars (38; in various sizes, from subcompact to luxury)
Station Wagons (5)
Pickups (5)
Campers (4)
Vans (6)
10-Wheelers (6)
Tractors (12)
Trailers (8)
Buses (6; both long and short)
Dropped Weapons (16; including spikes, mines, oil slicks, flaming oil slicks, smoke, and paint sprays)
Obstacles & Debris (9)
Fires & Wrecks (9)
* Note that some graphics are color mods of other graphics, and not entirely unique.
This artpack should prove useful for modern genre RPGs where you need to depict a car chase of some sort, or depict vehicular combat (for example, if you are playing GURPS Autoduel). It should also be useful for boardgames depicting vehicular combat, such as Car Wars, by Steve Jackson Games (but note that this artpack is not endorsed by SJG). Even if you don’t play “live” virtual tabletop games, this is a great way to illustrate PBEM or play-by-forum games.
The “Roads & Vehicles” artpack is a free download. Note that players will need to have this artpack installed during sessions where the GM will use it, and everyone should be using BRPG v1.8b or higher, or BGE v1.7 or higher.
Download:
Roads & Vehicles (10.2 MB)
Installation and usage instructions are in the ReadMe which is included in the download.
I wanted to point out a couple of things about this artpack:
- An internet connection is required in order to use the artpack.
- This free artpack differs from other free artpacks I’ve released previously, in that it may not always remain available for download, and even if you already downloaded it, it may cease to work. There is a “kill switch” in place just in case SJ Games has a problem with this artpack (they shouldn’t, since this is all-new artwork, and I am not including any SJG IP). Given that the future availability of this artpack is uncertain, no one should purchase the Battlegrounds software with the sole intent of using this artpack, since the artpack may be “pulled” at some later date without prior notice.
Unit Palette Available
Download from here (129KB)
I put together this Unit Palette to make the process of creating layouts with the “Roads & Vehicles” artpack much faster and easier. BRPG v1.8b or higher (or BGE v1.7 or higher) is recommended in order to use this Unit Palette to its full potential.
Installation instructions are included in the zip file. Only the GM/host needs to install these files. Players do not need to download or install the Unit Palette.
Enjoy!
How To Use the Unit Palette
Load the included Encounter file (Game File, in BGE terminology). This will automatically load the relevant Media Asset Bundle (which contains the rendered text labels). The Encounter will present you with a blank map canvas, with the Unit Palette located just above the map. Simply copy a unit from the palette that you wish to place on the map, paste it to the desired spot on the map, and then use the token-swapping hotkeys to select the exact token you wish to use. When you are satisfied with your token selection, select the “Keep Only Current Token” command from the unit’s contextual popup menu. After fine-tuning the exact placement of the unit on the map window (and perhaps adjusting the stacking order of the unit using the Unit Manager), you will probably want to select the “Tile” command to lock the unit in place and force it to be drawn underneath the grid overlay.
The Unit Palette also comes in Deployment format, so that you can easily import the Unit Palette into any existing Encounter to continue fleshing it out.
Regardless of whether you use the Encounter or the Deployment, when you no longer need the Unit Palette on the map window (e.g., if you are finished creating your layout), simply select the entire Unit Palette with the selection marquee and delete it from your Encounter.
I came up with this generic turning key that can be used for any game requiring movement angles to be measured.
It is actually a two-token unit. The first token is the full-size version, and with a hotkey press you can “minimize” it by displaying the alternate tiny token so that it doesn’t obscure the map & any adjacent tokens, yet is still readily available when needed.
You could use just one of these Turning Keys for the entire game (it is owned by everyone, so anyone can use it), or duplicate as many Turning Keys as you need and keep one (minimized) beside each vehicle.
Here are the files necessary to add this Turning Key to your BRPG Encounters or BGE Game Files. Installation and usage instructions are included in the Zip file.
Anyone using this artpack to play Car Wars will want to download the 1/4″ Grid Overlay that I posted in the User Creations subforum (registration required)