The thing I noticed about the pre-war EG and G compared to my postwar EG is that the wood at the top of the wrist is more graceful. They beefed up the wood at the top of the wrist post war, it makes the lines not flow as well and looks a little clunky.
I noticed that too. The Post war EF has a a distinctive hump in the curve of the stock behind the tang. I suspect Savage did this in an attempt to reduce cracks. The nose of the comb as well as the rear points of the check pads are also slightly sharper, and the pistol grip is a bit more fully shaped. The forearms on postwar EGs are also more robust, again likely done by Savage to counter forearms cracking at the tip and breaking out at the top corners where the wood mates to the frame.
There are visible differences in the shaping of the metal too such as at the top to the immediate left of the bolt and along the sides of the lever lug. I've been meaning to check more into this but I have a hunch the receivers on post war EGs (and likely all such 99s) are a bit beefier - as though they left more material on the receivers walls. And I think that little by little all of these things add up to the pre-war guns having a lighter look and feel than those that were made after WWII. Which is why I call the prewar 99 the EG-LW in comparison to the post-war 99. They simply are nice guns.