Perhaps we could get an update for smithing at some point? (yes i know there are many other fixes we need)

That and Silver Weapons.

And sky forge steel daggers, and Nord hero bows, and... There are far to many small but very annoying bugs like this ten months after release.

Life is full of annoyances.

Is scaled horn armor any good?

It's good enough, it's a matter of visual taste. I picked my armor because I liked how it looked, hitting the armor cap isn't hard with smithing.

I agree with the OP, though. It feels like oversight, not design choice or anything.

Quite a lot of them, on pc it's an fix for this.