Well, it’s true that Poser has no way at all to generate UVs and is very limited in it’s modeling capabilities with modifiers being the only real mesh tools availble. Magnets, hair manipulation, a few others. But it is possible to use any mesh directly inside the program. Essentially Poser is a rigging tool that works as does any good bone system. It’s also true that you are limited in your animation but only because the rigging is seperated from the rendering engine, something like Lightwave’s seperate modeler and renderer. Poser can set keys and animate the same as any good bone system can. Poser also has an extremely good morph system that will be dificult to duplicate in blender. Blender 2.42 will have shape keys though so that, now, you can setup morph targets in a similar manner. Blenders shape keys will need some extra work to make them useable. You’ll actually have to set up your own interface to use a slider the same way you would use a dial in Poser I believe.
Poser even has a nodal based materials system (since a while back actually). You can achieve very nice results with their materials. You will probably find their raytracing engine to be a little less than state of the art. But all of the seriously lame renders on the web being contributed to the program really don’t do it justice. That kind of quality is due more to the nature of the clientele the price range seems to attract. The engineers who’ve put the software together have done their homework. The underlying infrastructure is actually basically no different than the high-end softs. 
(For a final rendering though you’ll want to use a dedicated app. (Which begs the question, “Bryce renders are so lame why?”) Vue has good support for poser animation and materials.)
Poser’s stongest point is its ability to cross-morph between unlimited targets resulting in a remarkable ability to create a truly wide range of characters. Poser’s interface however is somewhat limited. Blender’s strongest point is the unrestricted environment. Weight painting, bone drawing, etc. will be less difficult in blender than Poser after you’ve masterd the technique. Blender can also update a mesh in place without having to re-rig and then generate a decent render.
There seems to be a reasonably lucrative market for Poser geometry. With blenders latest obj in/out, one could easily build these targets, props, etc. in blender and send them around to the various market places.
The question is do you want to spend the time or the money? Sometimes hiring an artist to work for you is a time saving practice. Studio Orange is not a one person operation, as an example.