Catalyst is not less complex than Mojolicious, if that is your measure of goodness. From an installing pov or from usability. In Mojolicious you don't need Moose, and you don't have an explicit model layer so you aren't pushed towards using an ORM. You can use either, but they aren't a hard or suggested requirement. The MojoCasts might be a good place to start if all you've done is read and come up with a slightly off impression http://mojocasts.com/e1