What is your preferred mount gear setup?

I know I am way behind the crowd on this stuff, but I am finally able to craft my own mount gear aaaand was a little saddened that even the Acrylia was not as good as hua jubilee gear. That being said, there are pieces that aren't available in hj gear that can be crafted. Now that I have many gear slots cleared, it is time to saddle up. Which has me wondering what will be the best combos.

First off, crafting gear.
1) Specifically, which is better, Hackamore of Skill, or the Hackamore of Progress (or the Saddle of Artisan versus Saddle of Durability)? I hate math, so please help me understand the difference of these two so I can decide which is best for my characters.
2) Is the crit bonus from say Barding of Striking just for combat? Or does that also factor into crafting?

And combat.
3) I am not a raider, so what's the most effective combo.

You probably want to set up two or maybe three tack sets. Do one for regular crafting, one for experimentation, and one for harvesting. Crit Bonus is a combat stat.

I'm not sure what level you are as a crafter. At the start of an expansion, the handcrafted tack is usually better than whatever you have from a prior tier. The Hua Mein gear gets upgrades each summer generally. Then as the new expansion goes forward, we get recipes and tack patterns from the crafting sig line, daily/weekly crafting missions, sometimes from researcher missions.

Mount tack will have various effects, and typically effects don't stack, you can have one of each type:

• Mounting Crafting Success: increases success chance while crafting.
• Mounting Crafters Experience: increases tradeskill XP.
• Mounting Critical Crafting: Increases critical success while crafting.
• Mounting Durability: increases the amount of durability while crafting.
• Mounting Modified Durability: honestly, I dunno how this differs from Mounting Durability
• Mounting Experimental Modified Durability: increases the durability while experimenting
• Mounting Progress: increases the amount of progress while crafting.
• Mounting Modified Progress: honestly, I dunno how this differs from Mounting Progress
• Mounting Experimental Progress: increases amount of progress while experimenting
• Mounting Modified Experimental Progress: honestly, I dunno how this differs from Mounting Experimental Progress
• Mounting Harvesting: increases rare harvest chance.
• Prospecting: tack with prospecting helps with shadow prospecting, which hopefully we will never need again.

Roughly, in increasing amount of whatever stat is being boosted, mount tack goes in this order:

• 120 Veilwalker
• 120 Sanctum
• 120 Empyral
• 120 Sambata
• 120 Acrylia
• 120 Shadowscream
• 120 Void Etched
• 121 Svarni
• 125 Forlorn
• 125 Vacrul

Sometimes you can get the patterns and maybe even recipes on the broker. Some of the patterns youi may not be able to get as a crafter. But at least this will give you a general idea.

I haven't even gotten a grasp on salvaging. Now you want me to start experimenting? LOL
Thanks for clarifying about Crit Bonus.

I have two characters that are 120 or above tradeskill. Both from a level boost (because...frustration). But they are too low adventure level to actually use any of this gear. A few other characters are high enough adventure level, but I had wanted to get them through the TS questlines on lower levels rather than boost them (altaholicism is the source of frustration).

Regarding Hua Jubilee mount gear, I noticed the buffs they give are identical to the Shadowscream versions. That will save me a bunch on rares. Luckily, even though I am waaaayyy behind the crowd on adventuring through zones, etc. I have been stocking up on harvests through Overseer. So I do have a healthy supply to craft Shadowscream tack that isn't in the Hua Jubilee collection.

Barding effects do stack from what I can see. At least the ones on the bottom row do (ton of unlocks from Overseer). I will have to go back to find a mount that had all the slots unlocked to try to experiment further. Unfortunately, it never occurred to me how important it was to unlock Pack Ponies. I am even having to take a few high level characters back to Mara to earn enough faction for the Pegasus.

It doesn't help that I had packed away mounts that had most or all slots unlocked when I upgraded to VoV CE. Guess I should pull someone's out to test what stacks and what doesn't.

Although I have the recipes for VE gear, I am wondering, since I am not a raider, nor ever plan to raid, how much energy should I put into acquiring these other recipes and patterns if all I do is solo? I see VE requires two things that I don't already have. What will I miss out on if I choose not to chase after these elusive patterns?

I really wouldn't worry about it. The Svarni stuff is one level higher and much better.

I haven't seen any of the Svarni recipes yet. Do those require patterns?

I don't think I've made any of the crafting ones. The Svarni Bardings of the Potent don't require a pattern at all.