Serial Hobbiest from United States, TX Public Profile

It is hard to imagine giving any Nightforce product a rating below 5 stars. This is my 4th Nightforce scope and the first time Nightforce has disappointed me. See Below:

Pros:
Weight - With many 1-4X optics weighing in at 16oz, the NX8's 17oz is impressive.
Illumination - True daylight visibility allows running this optic like a red dot at 1x.
Reticle - The "halo" around the center dot looks like a red dot at 1x and expands to a nice halo at higher magnification.
Durability - I didn't test this, but its a Nightforce. I'm assuming it is durable.

Cons:
The reticle has a 1.25 MOA center dot. It is barely visible at 1x and unnecessary as the "halo" forms a dot, but at 8X the 1.25 MOA dot is HUGE. An 8x optic should easily be able to engage targets past 400 yards (should be good to 800), but at 400 yards the center dot covers over 5.25" of target, and at 800 it would cover 10.5". The center dot should have been .5 MOA to give this scope maximum functionality. I hunt hogs in Texas from 20 feet away with an AR and red dot to over half a mile with a DT SRS-A1. I can't imagine precision shooting past 250 yards with the NX8 due to the 1.25 MOA dot. This makes the magnification above 4x more of a gimmick than a usable function.

Conclusion:
I am sorely disappointed with this scope. It has the potential to be one of the most versatile scopes on the market for short to medium range, but the reticle drastically limits its capabilities. If Nighforce would release the NX8 w