I'm thinking about trying the upcoming Advent of code with Raku, but I have never used it and it looks too complex to be picked up in a week or two. Any thoughts?
I don't feel like it's too complex. I started working with it about two years back and was productive within the first hour.
You definitely don't have to use everything. The only "requirement" you need - I use the term very loosely - is knowing how to use sigils ($,@,%,&) and understanding when to use which, which is easier than it looks. The rest of the knowledge comes naturally if you're inclined to refactoring.
For me, that means I'd write the most verbose solution first, then slowly work my way down to fewer SLoC. A recent programming problem took about 20 lines in Python but was a one-liner in Raku. I know SLoC isn't everything but it provides the dopamine this lizard brain craves, haha.
