Yes of course it is the sale price that is tempting me. That is what sales are all about!
It really is long term value that I am looking for, which is a problem that I have had with Daz. Years ago I got Bryce when Bryce and Vue were similar packages (even then Vue was slightly better) now vue is miles ahead of Bryce and Bryce has been semi-officially mothballed. The risk I see is that Daz will decide that Carrara is "good enough" and not improve it. I need a suite that I can grow into as my needs increase. And I do use my graphics software for business so I do keep an eye on expense. Right now Blender is meeting all my modeling needs, but they keep promising/threatening a major interface rewrite. It was a major shock last time when they changed a few of the hotkeys...can't imagine what a major rewrite would be like.
Carrara does have a trial version but it is for 6.1 and does not have any of the new features, but I can look at the interface.