For now. The thing to keep in mind is that ultimately the carriers pushing a phone is what the manufacturer cares about. If VZW goes to HTC and says "Fix your boot loader unlock or we will drop you", they will fix it.
Are the lock downs on Verizon only or all Samsung S4s.
Why not a Sony phone? They seem to be playing very nice with devs. Maybe an HTC One. From what I've seen its relatively easy to root and unlock the bootloader.