i had this ancient .xsession file that i've been maintaining for close to a decade now. it originated as the startkde script that i edited to run i3 instead of kwin. it was awful. it grabbed kde internals and launched random shit. over time it started bitrotting and i've put up with things just... not working often
i just replaced it with a single `KDEWM=/usr/bin/i3 startplasma-x11` command and... everything works now? exactly as i want? holy shit