A lot of powerful scopes mentioned, its interesting to see what the long range fellas use
I forgot to mention I as most everyone else run FFP as if the second plane scopes maintain the reticle size regardless of power, unlike the FFPs that grow and shrink with the maginification, and in turn your reticle marks will always represent the same value. Also I won't use anything that has covered turrets, for distance Tactical exposed turrets are a must have.
Personally if money isn't an issue the NF NX8 in 4-32x50 is a workhorse and goes for $2150, next is the NF ATACR 7-35x56 for $3600,
Leupold realy starts the wallet burning with the Mark 5HD 7-35x56 at $3100 , and the monster is the Mark8 3.5-25x56 for a staggering $4699.99 When your wife gets mad at you for spending $600 for a barrel and in a womans mind its $600 of metal pipe lol, you punish her for the bitching and drop the Mark 8 on her so she can get pissed with at least a tad of feeling justified. lol
My favorites however are Vortex but a leupold or especially a Nightforce purist will never give them the praise they deserve. My Favorite is the new Razor HD GENIII 6-36-x56 for a steep $3999, and you can still find the HD GENII around in 4.5-27x56 , they list for $3599, but now having been replaced i've seen them for 3 and under. For the budget minded two of the nicest scopes for the money are the Venom 5-25x56 for $699, but I managed to find one on ebay with no reserve and got it for just a tick over $500, and it was new in the box. And my greatest score at auction was the Viper PST GENII 5-25x50. Retail is $1399, but I managed to find one brand new as an open box, which this case the acatual scope box itself was sealed but the cardboard box it shipped with was open. and I don't know how but i had the winning bid for $628.
Now for the joke of it all that happens when you mix big names, with lengendary history, egos get fueled and to stay that way the fuel source is money and legends can survive on minimum wage so the only way to ensure they stay legends is to get bigger and bigger price increasees till the amount is so large that it just has to be the best. Anyway i've shot with both the NF and Leupold scopes, as well as the decommission GII Razor which actually just sold recently to get the new one eventually, and at the moment still own and shoot with the Viper and the Venom, Now for the real truth. There are folks out there that will comment on the two ebay finds, and commend their quality look and then take aim down lane and are really impressed, and then i'll notice they're using a $35 walmart bushnell or even crazy names i've never heard of with all cluttered, poorly finished designs, and odd size glass etc. So to them when the hear the price they take a step back and go whoa, as i guess $35 to over a grand would. This happens at a pulbic range with daily all day shooting for $10 and its a place you go to site in your stuff, or for testing, and it draws a lot of people who love guns, but can't afford a big membership at a club, and thats just fine.
Now the opposite is when I go to a private range i'm the loser lol, They look down at me twice, once for the low retail price, and a second time for getting the deals on ebay as not only am i not wealthy but i'm also cheap, hahaha, Now the facts and moral of the story, at my max of 1000 yards, and any other distance under 1000 and having tried various levels of magnification, which by the way, no matter what i use as my eyes are not like they used to be I take advantage of the ability to crank those scopes to max and then leave them there, and from there elevation, and parallax are all i adjust. Now i can only comment in normal bright daylight and clear weather conditions, but I kid you not, the differences in focal quality all the way to a thousand is so small i can barely tell. and Thats what all these companies beat into on and on about how much better this is to that la la la . Now in fairness both the leupolds and the NFs and the Big Vortex Razor should be indistinguishible anway as they're all in the same price range. and the Viper is claimed to be something like 30% clearer than the Venom and the the Razor is supposed to be so good, that after going from it back to the Venmon and Viper it should be so obvious that it proves too you just how much that extra few thousand did for perfections.lol
Sorry folks, just can't tell. which leads me to another point as there are many scopes in the 600 to 1200 range as well and i'm i'd have the same results with them. so as much as I love the NF NX8 or the Mark8 leupold, what am I getting for $4000? even the darn turrets were all about the same in precsion. at least for me at 1000 yards is just to fuel my ego. and probably why after discovering all this i havent got the new Vortex. Now I cannot comment on how they'd be in rain, or snow, or early morning or dusk which can be huge depend on how well they take light in. but for a normal day i'll equip any gun in the future in that price range, but probably never leave Vortex, because hands down their customer service and warranty are so amazing that I'll let the big money guys make fun of my stuff forever becasue check this out.
When I bought that Viper on ebay, it was brand new but technically used as it was a return so somes name was on it first.. but i get it and as i'm taking it out of the box ,I tripped and threw my arms forward launching the socpe out of my hand and 4 feet off the ground and sailed for around 6 feet then nose dove into the tile floor bounced end to and and smack two turrets leaving them dented and while no other marks were apparent i didn't know if the seals ruptured, or whatever. so I call vortex and tell them i needed a price to check it out. so asked me the whole embarassing story and he asked for my email and said it would be under warranty?? and i said but i got it off ebay , and i did the damage, and said i could have bought it broken, found it in a trash can, or smashed on purpose because i just felt like it and still covered, The warranty is lifetime, and available to anyone whose hands it passes. They said I i ever got a real deal on scope that someone damage and they were selling it for parts or whatever , to grab it because they were repair it and restore the finish back to as new standards!
So he said an overnight Fedex, with a form to sign that he prefilled with what happened, i shipped it on a Tuesday they got it wednesday, did the repairs, then call me me and emailed me to give me the details and shipped back thursday overnight and back on my gun, by Friday afternoon. Lastly the warranty applies to the entire line from thier lowest price offering up to the $4000 piece. So thats why i'm a vortex fan. Hope maybe theres some info of use to someone out there.
