[lmz]

Ansible has a steep learning curve? The easiest thing to do is just a list of steps (playbook) and I'm sure that is in the getting started docs.

Modularizing complicates things obviously but for simple uses I don't see how it can be simplified much further.

[allarm]

Yes, it was harder to master than terraform and even k8s. Their documentation was the reason, in most cases.