pumeco,

I appreciate your enthusiastic suggestion that I try Blender.  Thank you.

Perhaps it will help refine the flow of input if I further clarify what, exactly, I want to do.

I'm looking for something that will let me create realistic outdoor environments without having to model each individual blade of grass, tree, or cloud layer. 

For example, I want to be able to create a dense patch of forest, add a couple of Poser figures to the scene, and then render a Friday the 13th-esque image that depicts one of them impaling the other against a tree.

From what I've read of Vue and Blender's feature lists, Blender wasn't designed for that.  Vue was.  I just wasn't sure if a Poser > Vue workflow was worth $600 for a copy of 2014 Complete, so I thought I'd ask.