Framer, I am curious as to why you would ask opinions and then discount them. Here's a scenario, you depart. select VNAV and then are told to "Climb Now" fl XXX or ALT XX, how are you going to do this.?. ATC expect the climb to start pronto, and getting the PNF to dig in the FMC and remove the altitude constraints and then remain in VNAV is not a good idea. I dont want to get into a debate about thrust modes etc or FMAs.. just an opinion on how you would achieve this without using LVL Change or VS,