Guys, here is a demo I just watched for vray 2.0 and it looks really interesting. I was particularly interested in the displacement section around 32 minutes into the video.

I have tried to do displacement + transparency in mental ray and after days of pulling my hair out and nearly losing my voice from cussing at the computer I just gave up! Why? Because it should not be as convoluted as EVERY god damn thing is in mental ray!

The way it is done in Vray is the way it should be done! I plan to look into vray.

The Latest in V-Ray, Konstantin Gaytandzhiev, workshop at FMX 2012 - YouTube