This is shamelessly off topic but what’s the best tool right now for using open type features (like ligatures) for PDF typesetting from simple ascii text? I’m

This is shamelessly off topic but what’s the best tool right now for using open type features (like ligatures) for PDF typesetting from simple ascii text? I’m using asciidoc which has thankfully recently shipped hyphenation support, but I don’t think it supports ligatures. They feel like another must have for beautiful typesetting. I’m wary of TeX because I find it so hard to get the stylised results I want for our org (a school) but should I be less afraid? TeX based tools always felt content first, which is laudable, but presentation fanciness is a requirement when one works in pitching — in this case to school children.