Our mule deer eat a lot of sagebrush, especially in winter. Some individual plants get heavily browsed; others very lightly munched. I believe I've read that the plants respond to browsing by upping the production of chemical deterrents, making themselves unpalatable to the deer.
We have a young, maybe 5 year old, Artemisia tridentata that survived very heavy deer browsing one winter and now is avoided by the yard deer.
I'm not so sure that sagebrush obligate species such as pronghorn antelope and greater sage grouse are put off by anything that sagebrush can produce. They love the stuff. Interestingly, sage grouse are known to actually gain weight during winter eating nothing but sagebrush while wading in deep snow.