The thing is that this would seem to be a whole new shell, needing constant maintenance and adjustment to keep it current with KDE.

Whereas AIUI the alternative here is just a cosmetic change to Xfce and shouldn't need any maintenance at all. There are only new KDE releases once every 2 years.

I know which of those I'd want. As it happens, I also much prefer Xfce to KDE: it's smaller, simpler, lighter, faster, more coherent, and complies much better with Windows's keyboard UI.