I love those bland GUIs. That means using less system resources. Once you figure out how to use them you fell much more brilliant. I finally have Melda everything.
This was long and I skimmed through it. My issue with Waves is their licensing sucks. Waves is joyful that you are willing to pay. Around the turn of the century the 2 worst reputations were Waves and Pace(iLok). There's a reason why Waves does the $29 plugins and there are free plugin offers requiring iLok.
I have no issues with the quality of Waves but their licensing is so 1990's. All of the other developers you mentioned I have installed on 3 systems.
You can probably get the real thing at a garage sale or thrift store for about the same price. You could impress all of your friends telling them it's real cowbell in your mix.
I hear good things about the piano but I have so many of them and of course you can get some good ones from Sampletekk right now. It seems that new pianos, strings, and harsh sounding synths create oohs and aahs these days. It depends on what level you create and genres to not fall for is really gimmicks.
Upgrading from KU to KU doesn't really appeal when another $50 gives you KCE.
8dio took the thunder away from me continuing with KU or upgrading to KCE. I don't want to do anymore juggling with disk space. If you haven't bought individual NI products you can't downgrade.
I'm not sure it's worth it at that price. You get Stutter Edit 2 and some reverbs tied to an iLok.
If you have MP3 it may be a better offer to get Community bundle.