You one trying to convince even a small cam is gonna kill all performance based on made up torque numbers, not trying to brow-beat ya but you don't think people should do a 318 even in the best of times.
1st there's is plenty of evidence that all these 6 318 builds I'm talking about all smoke the stock one by a huge margin from 3000 rpm and on 80-85% of the full throttle powerband with stock stall. Even at 3000 rpms there's a 50-60+ lbs-ft gain over stock. So that leave 2000 to 3000 rpm with no real dyno evidence, so even if there a huge drop in tq under 3000 rpm not all of is gonna be a loss right at 2999 rpms since there's a gain 50-60+ lbs-ft @ 3000 rpm, so say at worst case 2700 rpms it starts to be less than stock is that 1st 700 rpm (2000/2700) really that more important than the next 2000-3000 rpms plus ? (2700/4700-5700) And that's with a cam that's 20 degrees more than stock what about ones with less?
Not trying to pick on you but people are trying to make decisions $$$$, and there's an obvious hole in your thought experiment.
As for your basic premise stall and gears vs cam swap be an interesting shootout.