I've understood it's simply intented to say that the frame retains the "effector" to the movement. Note that it says "capabilities", not "distances", "ranges" or anything directly referencing the distance the frame (or rather, the model representing the frame, obviously) can be moved.

You mean the "race of giants" rule? I admit I'm biased towards a certain interpretation since I believe I was the one who suggested it, but my idea of it is it simply means that if all your infantry frames are size 3 then there is no exclusive penalty associated with size 3 units. I don't think it's meant to say that you can generate from size 1/2 lists and then "cherrypick" the size to be 3.

So, since the Dragoon is obviously generatred from the size 2 list I think that the size is simply an error that has crept in along with the other "old army list" errors.

That said, since it's a flying unit the size issue in practice doesn't matter much one way or the other. The Dragoons aren't going to do a whole lot of climbing or hiding behind other units in any case.

The disadvantages of having a single big unit under the mob rule are indeed considerable and I'm sure they balance out the higher "breakpoint" in most quality classes. What I'm not entirely sure if they do so if you take a mob of Elites. Can't say if this is an issue really tho, since to actually get to field one at full strength would typically require serious choices at army design time, or a very big game, so it's not like I have tried it (or am likely to try for that matter).

You are correct that it's not said in the rules or in the errata that being in a mob formation doubles the unit's minimum size*. Likewise the errata has nothing further to say on the Unit Banner.

Because of the lack of contrary evidence and since these are not in direct oppostion one must conclude -- until Demian comes around and says otherwise -- that the relevant entries are correct as written.

I suppose it sorta makes sense from the rules standpoint as the Leaders of mob formation units are at reduced efficency and thus a unit banner can be used to compensate. It also might just make sense from the fluff standpoint as one might assume mobs like to rally around banners (or pitchforks and torches, but to itch his own as they say).

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*) I must add that this is really considered an error by other gamers in my group, but like I said, lack of contrary evidence etc.

MegaMiniature's latest batch of releases includes a new bug type alien cleverly dubbed "Biobug". The name might indicate traditonal Arachnid/Tyranid "biomechanic" bug, but the miniatures are of dude-in-suit type insectoids. Two sculpts come with techy weapons and 1 is unarmed, for a total of (just) 3 scuplts. The nominal scale is 25mm.
http://stores.shop.ebay.com/MegaMiniatures

Also still available from last month are humanoid doggy aliens, almost equally cleverly named "Kanines". The scale and the sculpt selection is similar to the Biobugs, as is the basic "human in a costume" aesthetic.

The site also provides rules for both, but not Defiance rules (fairly) obviously...

ZombieSmith has the new "Royalist" Quar out. As can be exepected, the only difference to the older ones looks to be in the guns and the uniforms.

The quick can see examples on their main page for a few days, while the dead will need to dig through their site:
http://www.zombiesmith.com/

January listing for NewBold include Shadowrun-style near future trolls and more space lizardmen:
http://www.newboldworld.com/09CS1/index.html

For a bit of old news, an up-and-coming company Ground Pounder Miniatures unveiled the first greens for its similarly up-and-coming miniature line (there is a game up-and-coming as well but we can safely ignore that ) last Christmas. Some nasty cyborgised combat biounits (derived from humans, ostensibly, but with those body plans who cares?) are shown. Also check out the gallery for some rather nice alien concepts.
http://www.ground-pounder.com/blog/?p=72

Smokingwreckage's latest effort, an authorized Kryomek(tm) conversion list is now up on my D:VG site:
http://herosgames.homestead.com/DVG.html

Like Brother Jim said, frame is essentially a statistics list from other minis games (or RPGs). The difference being that in many if not most miniature games, the stat line is introduced at unit level, while while in D:VG, a unit is a collection of Frames.

What models you use to represent the Frames on tabletop is more or less up to you: there is no need for all models of a given Frame to be exactly the same "type" of model (representing one unit as defined by a model manufacturer, that is), as long as they have recognizably similar level of equipment and can be thought to be of the same Quality (highly abstract at best).

Size is rather abstracted, and therefore open to personal interpretation: it's not something than can or need be expressed strictly in millimeters. The guidelines given in the book (pg. 11) however show that it's to be thought of as volume rather than height.

Size 1 is something around the size of dog, so smaller than most humanoids usually depicted in miniature. Size 2 is basically human-sized, or more abstractly the baseline model size, regardless of the species or army. Size 3 is like a very compact car, or indeed a mounted model, or a large battle suit like Terminator Armour. Size 4 would be something like a large car, and so on.

So a biggish dwarf (like Rackham's dwarves for example) would be more at Size 2 than Size 1, while in the Defiance universe the Meraxilla are still Size 2 as well, despite being clearly larger than humans (well in excess of two meters in height, judging by some pictures).

IIRC it is not very clearly stated that Vehicles need to be at least Size 4, but I've always taken it as implied under the standard rules. So ruleswise, Anime Mecha would be Size 4 and up, while a mecha suit model could be Size 3 or maybe even Size 2 Infantry, depending on how large it is compared to your baseline models.

If you look at the At-43 inspired lists on my site (http://herosgames.homestead.com/DVG.html) and compare them with the models, you can get more pointers as to how I've resolved the Size issue. But, like I said, it's not something that is exactly dictated.

Well, I was consciously trying to push the D:VG envelope a bit with Project Industrial Fantasy. It's a still ongoing -- albeit extremely slowly -- attempt to "simulate" a type of currently popular (in literature) fantasy with what is essentially a modern/science fiction game. Incidentally, the up-and-coming Defiance expansion likely contains another, fairly different take on the subject in the form of a new genre modification. I obviously used only what was in the original book.

IIRC Demian says somewhere that you can sensibly expect to get balanced results for periods extending from sometime in the 19th century on to the future. I should think this would indicate periods where firearms truly dominate the battlefield. D:VG wouldn't necessarily work as well for games in settings where close combat is the order of the day and a determined straight-out charge against ranged combat troops can still be considered a viable tactic. Or even where majority of the troops still only use hand weapons, regardless. Technically, it would be possible of course but the mechanic isn't meant for that so balance likely suffers.

Not a problem in itself with an industrial fantasy setting, of course.

As to using other ranged weapons than firearms, I don't think it's impossible in any way but you'll need to allow for them not being "realistic" in performance when compared to the future tech of TL3 stuff. Compared to early firearms, bows and crossbows (at the abstraction level used by D:VG) aren't necessarily much if at all inferior, performancewise. I do believe it was largely logistics that dictated the rise of rifles and you really can't factor all that much logistics into a D:VG force, aside of limiting the availability of certain troops.

All weapon frames designed as AOE have FR=1 and initial ammo limitation of 4 (and it can be upped to 6 by paying extra points), yes...

...but like I said, After-Burst is not a weapon per se. It's an augmentation to a weapon frame. Therefore I should think it does not affect the weapon frame itself directly beyond what is explicitly stated.

As to what is stated, my understanding of the entry is that

[*]It starts by stating that the After-Burst is an "also" effect which would imply the frame retains its point effect, which is something designed AOE frames do not have (so it can't be a normal AOE weapon in any case)[*]This is reinforced by stating the augmented weapon needs to score a damaging hit (worked out normally, for all I can tell) so that the After-Burst effect occurs (to be worked out separately)[*]Furthermore it is also expressly mentioned that the burst occurs touching the first target in the line of fire. Stating this would make little sense if the weapon would become FR=1 weapon due to the aug, as there would ever be at most one target hit in the line of fire