Quote - Thanks for the info, Mike. A painted weight map, that sounds cool. First hack I can think of... painted influence zones for deformers!

No problem.
Yeah, that's the essence of their power - as a customized falloff you can create on your own to your exact needs. And what's better yet is you can have vertices as parts of more than one weight map, allowing for even more control. Plus of course, you can change up, simply by telling whatever tool you're using to use whichever map you want, if that particular tool supports it, that is.
That's just how it is in LW. Other programs have more advanced weight mapping to be used for more tools.
But in the end it's just a way of designing your own falloff zones, but in a highly intuitive way, since you visually see exactly what points you're using.
Being able to do that in Poser would allow for some amazingly easy customizing of joints and deformations.