I have been gone for months and decided to try this latest patch, the game felt different after so many changes I missed, different but very interesting. The momentum and dodge were obviously the first things I noticed, but after a few minutes playing I adjusted myself and started enjoying it, sure felt unique and well polished.
I rushed to get a horse, bought the DLC and made several saddles and started trying them, testing both ranged and melee mounted combat. I struggled a bit at first, but after hours getting used to it I can say I managed to master the mounted combat, got my horse at lvl 20 and immediately noticed how great it is. The animations are perfect, saddles influence greatly how you wanna play and I also noticed the advantages and disadvantages being in a mounted combat
My character has 5 str, 40 agility, 38 accuracy (40 with bow) and 8 vitality, it wears light armor and I fight mostly with bow and dual daggers (now also a sword for mounted combat), always keeping distance to survive. But being mounted gave me a HUGE advantage over enemies, when you learn how to rush, how to knock them down, how to hit and keep moving to avoid being hit, mind the surroundings so you dont get cornered, manage stamina, etc… you can take on everything. Its a different playstyle should be trained and learned and it felt very rewarding improve and noticibly develop it in time. I even managed to solo a world boss for the very first time using a SWORD and CLOTH armor, something it was impossible with my build.
But mounted combat had a drawback, the momentum, you needed to learn it or it will kill you. While you can easily avoid being hit and immediately build distance to self heal its not something instant. Now they basically removed it, its too light. I tested some combats after the hotfix and it now fells trivial, nothing can hit me while Im mounted, its just easy hit and keep moving the horse, turn around and bash them on the move again, there is simply no reason to NOT go mounted the way it is, its safe, easy and basically has no drawbacks.
Funcom should have given players more time to learn the momentum before tweaking it, players should have not freaked out before actually investing hours training their skills, it was balanced, real and extremely rewarding to learn. I think it was a mistake change it so fast just to please the community, people are always resilient to changes, even if its for the better. I wasnt resilient because I was gone for months, so I could quickly noticed how it improved the game. The momentum how it is feels inexistent, mounted combat is so easy it feels trivial and overpower.