Catan is better, but is still heavily dependent on both randomness (favors new players) and snowballing (favors experienced ones). These kind of cancel each other out but it leads to a kind of knife-edge balance where it's only balanced because each player will have some sort of "bullshit" that can happen to them to let them win. This usually cancels itself out enough to make the game playable (and can even be fun in moderation) but there are definitely strategies (usually involving the robber) where it gets too out of hand. I once played a game with my cousin where they only ever got 1 extra point (a settlement) the entire game, at the very end. Not super fun for them.