No. A forum search will reveal that there will still be some packet forwarding for a while after 1st Dec for gateways but nothing for devices - they will have to be on v3.
You could always upgrade the gateway firmware / settings.
and, after that, will it essentially become “free” and unattached?
Indeed.
There is no new firmware available; I think it’s just a matter of changing the “lorawan server” address from ‘router.eu.thethings.network’ to ‘eu1.cloud.thethings.network’ ?
LOL, it’s always a bit meta when you talk someone in to solving a problem by getting them to be brave enough to try the things they’ve been suggesting and then they mark the technical bit as the solution when the problem wasn’t really technical …