I do think the mount system was way better pre-breeding for the following reason :
Perfect mounts came in with breeding and it was not only creating a major imbalance (you either have had a perfect mount ,or you were fucked) giving all pvp abilities to a player : speed, dps, carryloot ability, luxury to engage or disengage at will. but also killing the purpose of having any others kind of mounts
Imo, it break some logic that was ingame pre breeding.
To me, a naked tamer getting a solid desert horse should always be faster than a mounted knight.
I wish we could see the "trade off" mounts a bit like it was pre-breeding :
-Fast mount ( low hp, excessive speed desert horse kind mount)
-Combat mount ( hp, carry ability and decent speed)
-Farming mount : decent speed, increased carry capacity, decent hp (steppes, jotuns)
- tank mounts : donkey/molva kind : HPbags, huge carry capacity, slow max speed but better climbing than other mounts
I do think having a perfect kind of mount in every of thoses categories would be ok. I think having 1 perfect kind of mount only would be a huge mistake, and kill the purpose of having any kind of other mounts.
Or, make it based on ingame mechanics such as terrain , heat system , armor weight , etc to balance mounts ( like bullhorse were nerfed in desert in sarducca while desert horse were adapted to the environement ) but it would seriously need a deep , polished, and complete system to properly work.