If you are learning then do it properly with a full rig. Vert posing shouldn't be easier than rigging, if it is you need to work on your rigging. Something I really need to work on :S
I agree. You skin to a deformation rig that blends it's constraints between the biped and another full rig that drives the animation after the character is cut in half (or whatever) Working like this has a lot of benefits - not least that you separate the topology of the deformation rig from the topology of the animation…