however before that I need to learn the "glass texture" part of BATing ....
3dsMax comes with a bunch of materials. In the various 3dsMax directories (Mydocs/ProgramFiles) you will find a "materiallibraries" folder (I actually have 5 such folders installed by default). One or more of them will have a bunch of stuff where you can find a glass material I am sure.
When you first make a new material, the default type is "Standard". Once you've set the lights, you will find an "Arch-and-Design" option if you clicked on that Standard button. Arch and Design has a bunch of templates with many types of glass.
As a side, I have a 3dsMax Tutorials folder in MyDocs. In it is a Scene Assets folder, and in that is an Images folder. Images is full of things you might find useful. (And if the prefab materials aren't working properly, they are probably trying to reference those images but can't find them).
BAT actually comes with a few textures, but nothing outstanding. There is a simple glass texture, which might be a good starting point to at least see what makes glass work (not much, you will find).
By "test renders" you actually mean real ingame shots? Or just exporting the sc4model and saving the images with Ilive's reader?
Both, I guess. You wouldn't necessarily have to share those images with us, just for personal reference. Maybe this is just on my computer, but I've often been discouraged when the 3dsMax preview doesn't look like what I actually get.