My intention is to use Carrara to work from scratch, using it as a cheap alternative to Maya. I have a degree in digital media, and want a package I can make video game assets and cutscenes with. I will never touch Daz content with it. I have had my fill of that, having used Poser since version 4.

Then you should have few issues. True DAZ has sadly lagged carrara behind the more up to date/pricy apps in it's never ending goal to make it Studio pro. Spending most of it's developmental time working to make it more DAZ content friendly. Out side of tweaking a few features most of C8.5 was to make it DUF/genesis compatible.