Well, if SQL Server is trying to separate the read from the write, why don’t I just do that myself? I had the idea to read the data I needed in an INSERT…SELECT statement, writing into a memory-optimized table variable (motv). I could make sure the read included all the columns I need to calculate the new value, including the CASE statement I had in the SET clause of the UPDATE.
Click through for Jared’s explanation of how to implement it, as well as the circumstances in which it might be faster than what you get by letting a single T-SQL statement handle the job.