Pick a step on the left.
Seven short chapters, in the order you would actually do them.
The downloadable guides are listed below.
1. Install VanguardCity
Overview
One installer covers 3ds Max 2024, 2025, 2026 and 2027. It detects which of
them you have and installs only those.
Steps
- Close 3ds Max — the plugin files cannot be replaced while Max is holding them open.
- Run the installer as administrator. It writes into
C:\Program Files\Autodesk\3ds Max 20NN\Plugins\, which needs elevation.
- Windows may warn you. The installer is not code-signed yet, so SmartScreen has no download history for it. The SHA-256 under the download button is how you confirm the file is ours.
- Start Max and create a VanguardCity object.
REQUIREMENTS: an NVIDIA CUDA-capable GPU.
The road network is solved on the GPU, which is what makes large layouts
practical.
2. Activate your licence
Overview
A licence is tied to one computer by that machine's firmware ID, and is a
signed file. Nothing contacts a server while you work.
Steps
- Create an account at vanguardfx.pro and request the free 7-day trial — one per email address. The trial runs everything; it exports 40 frames.
- Copy the hardware ID the plugin shows you.
- Give that ID to the site or to @Vanguard_MyLicense_Bot, and you receive a licence file.
- Save it to
%LOCALAPPDATA%\VanguardFX\.
MOVING TO ANOTHER PC: the licence is bound
to the machine that requested it. Contact support and we will reissue it —
copying the file across will be refused.
3. Your first city
Overview
A city is built in stages, and each stage has its own button. You can stop
after any of them and keep what you have.
Steps
- Create a VanguardCity object and set Block Size and the area you want covered.
- Press Generate to solve the street network. Choose a grid layout, or let the tensor field grow the streets organically.
- Press Generate Parcels to divide the blocks into plots.
- Press Generate Buildings to raise massing on those plots.
THE SEED: Seed is what makes one
city different from the next. Change it and regenerate to try another
arrangement of the same settings; keep it and nothing moves.
4. Start from a real place
Overview
Instead of a blank plane, you can begin from a real street layout exported
from OpenStreetMap.
Steps
- Go to openstreetmap.org, find the area you want, and use its Export tab to save an
.osm file.
- Press Import OSM File... in the plugin and pick that file.
- Generate as usual. The imported streets replace the generated network; parcels and buildings follow them.
IF THE IMPORT COMPLAINS: the plugin will
tell you when the file is an HTML page rather than OSM data — that
usually means the export failed and the browser saved an error page instead.
Download it again from the Export tab.
LICENCE OF THE DATA: OpenStreetMap data
is © OpenStreetMap contributors under the ODbL. VanguardCity does not
bundle or redistribute any of it — you import your own file — but
if you publish work derived from it, that licence's terms apply to you.
5. Detail and lighting
Overview
Once the shape of the city is right, the detail passes fill it in. Each has
a budget, so you can decide how much of it you can afford.
Steps
- Terrain — Terrain Height, Terrain Detail and Terrain Smooth shape the ground the streets are resolved against.
- Bridges — Bridge Budget decides how many the generator may build where the roads need them.
- Street furniture — street lights, name signs, billboards, blade signs and cables, each with its own count or budget.
- Interiors — Interior Floors and Interior Furniture build rooms behind the windows that are close enough to see into.
- Light zones — night lighting is driven by zones rather than placed lamp by lamp. Street Lamps Lit and the aviation lights on tall towers are set here.
BUDGETS FIRST: every budget is a ceiling,
not a target. Lowering one is the fastest way to get a heavy city back to an
interactive viewport.
6. Materials
Overview
The City Material is one node that knows what a city is made of — 46
named surfaces, from asphalt and kerbs to facades, glass, roofs, signage,
foliage and vehicle liveries.
Steps
- Press Build City Material to create it and wire it to what the generator produced.
- Set the night mode and its lit percentage: windows light up as a proportion of the whole, not one at a time.
- Use weathering, variation and seed so the same street does not repeat itself down its length.
RENDERER AWARE: it writes Physical
Material, plus V-Ray and Corona light materials where a surface actually
emits — lit windows, signage and vehicle lights.
7. Tips and troubleshooting
Best practice
- Shape first, detail last. Get the street network and the massing right before turning on interiors, props and cables — those are the passes that cost.
- Change the seed, not the settings, when you only want a different arrangement of the same city.
- Save the scene once the layout is what you want.
If something looks wrong
- The OSM import refuses the file — it is almost always an HTML error page saved instead of the data. Export it again.
- The viewport has become slow — lower the interior, prop and cable budgets before lowering the block count.
- Still wrong? Send us the scene or a description at @Vanguard_MyLicense_Bot.