I have the same problem as you have (but I need a pt_BR keyboard layout instead of de). I can't get it work with KDE 4 and Xorg/HAL, so my solution was to emerge xorg-server with USE flag "hal" disabled :-)
- [gentoo-user] KDE4 doesn't heed hal keyboard settings Frank Steinmetzger
- Re: [gentoo-user] KDE4 doesn't heed hal keyboard s... YoYo siska
- Re: [gentoo-user] KDE4 doesn't heed hal keyboard s... Crístian Viana
- Re: [gentoo-user] KDE4 doesn't heed hal keyboa... Frank Steinmetzger
- Re: [gentoo-user] KDE4 doesn't heed hal keyboa... Frank Steinmetzger
- Re: [gentoo-user] KDE4 doesn't heed hal ke... Crístian Viana