I tried a saddle for all my bear hunts last season. I am going back to a stand now. Things I didn’t like are:
You need more accessories and stuff to make it work. You HAVE to have a hook to hang your bow and backpack. It takes a little more time to put all that up and down in the tree. I can hang a lightweight stand faster than a saddle platform etc.
You can’t leave stuff in your pockets or it eventually will pinch you while in the stand. Phone, wallet, knife, wind checker, all need to go in the backpack. This can be a pain when you are eating a snack or something and need to stash it quickly.
Its harder to put on rain pants. This caused me to get soaked on one sit last season.
You need a little more open tree unless you set up to shoot directly behind you (which is less than ideal). The saddle relies on swinging around the tree to be able to “shoot 360 degrees” which requires a pretty open tree. Even to shoot just on your strong side you need to have no limbs on that side of the tree. With a stand you can set up to shoot straight out away from the tree and you naturally have better clearance not trying to shoot across limbs.
Its not as comfortable after 3 hours for me. I ended up adjusting and moving around a ton trying to stay comfortable.
Its not that much lighter unless you don’t use a platform. My saddle platform was 3lbs and my millennium m7 stand is 8.5lbs. I will carry the extra 5.5lbs for the extra convenience any day.
The positives of the saddle:
Its more compact and easier to carry through brush.
Without the platform you could get it down fairly light for backcountry hunts. Its less comfortable this way but for an elk/bear wallow 5 miles deep it might be worth a try.