I was watching a 3ds max tutorial and the tutor was constantly using the ffd modifier. He basically selected a few vertices, applied the ffd transform and just moved the control points around.
In Blender that seems to be way more verbose. Selecting vertices, adding them to a vertex group, create a lattice box, scale and place it in the correct spot, apply the lattice modifier and select the lattice + vertex group.
Is there maybe a similar tool in Blender to achieve the same effect without using lattice?