Personally, I'd much rather have a spotting scope. Which one depends on what I'm doing. On the ground I'd probably want something with a reticle, a Spotter 60 is best but I'd probably have to settle for a 20-60 Mk4. I did settle for a USO observation scope at 15-45x. That's enough mag to see a hit and when I get some practice with it I'm sure it'll be fine for spotting trace too, which is even more important.
Spotting on the line, as an instructor, I preferred the Kowa spotting scopes. We had 'em on tall stands. Angled eyepiece. Wanna say they were 20-60x but can't be positive, never used 'em on full mag to spot trace anyway, which they were excellent at.
Binos are bit restricted in that sense and have less mag. Not adj. I have some 7x50 Fujinon's and they're nice and have a reticle and are good for scanning in the distance but not much else really. I can't see bullet holes in targets with 'em, especially when an 18x scope won't either. So they have limited use to me. I have no use for the big heavy ones, but these military ones are well made, good glass and can take a helluva beating and the ARDs for them are very nice and dirt cheap on ebay (worth it just to protect the lens, they have big rubber caps).
But if you don't have a pair of binos, getting a good pair won't hurt. It seems there are some very good ones around for a good price. I think the ones I have were around $800 new but can be found used surplus for $250 or so. If I was to buy new ones today though, I'd probably take the advice of some of the guys above. Know that a good pair is always better than a cheap pair, for instance, these 7x binos see MUCH better than a cheap pair of 10x binos, not to mention all the other attributes such as depth, etc. There's something to be said for clarity, for good glass.
