I haven’t tried it yet, but Lovetap or Predatory Blade, with blunt fitting, should also work.
I like the mounts but probably won’t bother with them too much. They prevent you from taking a follower around which is infinitely more important than having a mount.
Actually it was a really bad design decision from Funcom to have mounts count as followers. Those two systems had to be completely separate from each other in my opinion.
I’ve enjoyed my horse a lot more than I thought I would. I do wish I could take a follower with me, but it’s a good thing that I was able to adapt to the new dodge, so I don’t need a thrall as often. I’m probably going to take a thrall with me when I’m going on a speed-grinding round, and when that happens, I’ll just use map rooms and run around on foot. If I happen to be riding around and then want to do something that requires a thrall, I’ll have to ride to the nearest map room and switch.
I agree there’s some added inefficiency there, but it looks like it’ll be corner cases at best. At worst, I’ll just end up using my mount much less, just like you said.
It does look like a bad design decision, but then I stop and think about the alternative and it looks even worse. Right now, the cap range goes from 55 for one player to 100 for a full clan. A lot of players are screaming bloody murder because of it. I can think of no way of splitting that cap into two that wouldn’t make players even madder.
I mean, take 55 and try to split it:
- 10 horses and 45 other followers?
- “Who the hell needs 10 horses, are you crazy?”
- 1 horse and 54 other followers?
- “But what if I want to have two horses? That’s not fair!”
- 5 horses and 50 other followers?
- “There are 6 horse variants alone in the game and you only let me have 5 horses!”
- “I’m never gonna need more than 1 horse, this is a waste!”
This way, everyone can decide just how much of their cap they want to dedicate to horses. 
How many horses you are allowed to have is much less of a problem compared to not being able to take a follower with you at all when you ride a horse.
If you think about it, the mount is not meant to have the same function as a fighter thrall or pet. It is therefore nonsensical to have it level up and get attributes like a follower does. The devs could have implemented mounts as a separate system and have kept the exact same funtionality. For example: 5 types of mounts available, each one with their own perks. In addition, 10 levels of saddles available, again with their own boni. I don’t get why the mounts need to be within the follower system and level up etc., except of course for the programming budget constraints that Funcom might have.
Oh, I agree that they’re not useful in their follower role. I think that, ideally, they should allow us to bring a thrall while riding and tweak the horse leveling so there’s no fighting involved, etc. But I think that horses should count towards the follower cap.
Well the solution I found for myself was to install the Better Thralls mode and increase my follower count.
Now I just need to find a mod that makes the movement responsive and fluid again and I’m set.
I find it same clunky like in RDR2… I am probably just bad at horsing around…
I can confirm Lovetap is working.
But it appears to be doing considerably less concussion damage, compared to blunt arrows.
Plus you have to be extra careful, when Hunting Exiles.
Hiting them with the horse is enough to kill them.
Thanks for checking. I’m still gonna go with that, because I hate crafting and carrying arrows 
i would love to have my say on this but the xbox crashes so much i have not been able to ride a mount yet ,sort it out
The xbox version of this game sounds like really bad…
Horses are awesome, fun, and now im spoiled and hate to have to run with my own two feet.
Also they are OP as hell, i just wish i could ride it in the dungeons. Horse is like turning yourself into a thrall. it is OP
The lance is crazy strong too.
You can kill worldbosses with it or what should be crazy strong?
If you can aim your lance correctly it’s very deadly when hitting a creatures at full speed, even with an unlevelled horse.
A king scorpion has: 23529 HP… I am not talking about killing exiles or weak creatures… I can do that with pretty much anything. I often kill exiles with my fists, because I am bored.
I talk about real challenges like mini-bosses, worldbosses, etc.
We have a race track set up for Saturday night races. Its kinda like pod racing, only Dafari, no sand peeps.
We keep two per server. You need a spare, they do die. Only when your dumb tho.
On the official server we have 4. 2 wars 2 scouts.
I tamed a foal, and tried it for a couple of hours, they are not bad designed to be honest, but it’s really not my type of game; damn I’m the type of guy that played RDR2 almost always on feet ! (yes yes I know, don’t say anything).
Now the horse is parked near the grass int he back of the base living its life as a retired animal ^^