Re: How to demo GURPS?
Demoing at cons I usually do a very mixed Infinite Worlds team thrust into some weird alternate parallel - pregenerated characters obviously.
Caravan to Ein Aris is nice (and free), but it doesn't really show off any of the things that make GURPS special. Of course that might not matter if this is the type of campaign your group wants to be playing. I ran it twice on cons and the first time, when I did it by the book without magic, it was a bit disappointing. Any larger injury will basically put a character out of commission for a considerable time. If you run it, I would at least expect some healing potions, better characters with access to magic.
Generally, I agree with the mook. Find out what your characters want to play first - both campaign and characters and go on from there. The forums are quite helpful in building campaigns and characters, just be aware that you'll get a thousand recommendations about what books to buy. Depending on how far you want to take your campaign you actually might want to consider buying some of the big ones, but you can have a lot of fun just with the Basic Set (Powers helps, but is not absolutely necessary for half the campaigns).
Once you found out what your players want, design their characters yourself (or ask for help on the forum) and then go over the sheet with them, making sure they understand everything that's there and revising as needed. Real character building by players won't happen until after you've had a couple of adventures under your belt. Even then a good GM never just expects their players to bring characters without looking them through beforehand.
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