I've bought and cried several times recently.
T2 still the best for ruggedness, and battery life. On one rifle I have it in a Unity Fast mount. Cool to have your back up rear iron built into the mount. Makes it easy to put the Unity magnifier mount (excellent) behind it. I went with the cheaper chicken Aimpoint 3X-P magnifiers. Not enough difference in optical quality to opt for the 3X-Mag1 at like $900. I can't justify it. I just don't run a magnifier enough.
I love the Aimpoints, even if the price has become so ridiculous that it seems kinda like extortion at this point. They have battery lives measured in years and great dots with no parallax to speak of. Of course they last a loooong time too. I still have two T1s with 4 MOA dots that I bought before they had 2 MOA dots.
On another rifle I have an EOTech EXPS w/NV on a Unity riser and with a Unity EOTech magnifier 5X. Many moons (Years and Years) ago I had an EOTech that that failed on me. I sent it in and they fixed it, but I never trusted it after that. The battery life sucked too. Then EOTech had a recall and BOUGHT my EOTech back from me. YAY. But over the years EOTech has made huge improvements in quality and features. They also greatly increased battery life. Plus they have useful warnings of low battery life and I believe mine have auto off features which I have not tried. The view is awesome and of course the reticle is amazing. I've re-discovered EOTech for certain applications.
So, the 5X Magnifier is over kill, but cool. I would say, unless you have a demonstrated need for 5X the 3X is fine, especially if you are using it on a short rifle. The 5X has a much less forgiving eye box. One thing I hate are the centering knobs on the EOTech magnifiers... Jeez they are awful. When manipulating the magnifier in the riser, they get turned, which puts your dot off center and if you are picky like me it really throws you off.
One hundred concepts (
onehundredconcepts.com) makes a solution for this, at a price. I haven't done it yet, but probably will.
One common thing here is tall optics mounts. The Unity mounts are not necessary unless you find them useful for night vision passive aiming. I'm barely into NV, but if you are or will be passive aiming using your optic it might be worth looking into.
The other advantage of the tall optics are that you can use a more upright stance when walking with the optic reticle in view. This aides somewhat in situational awareness.
The only IR laser/illumination I could afford was the DBAL D2 which is a brick on the end of your rifle, seriously. If you can passive aim all you need is an illuminator without the laser and a GOOD optic with good NV settings. And the EoTech is currently the best. The Aimpoint is also good, but substantially less good than the EOTech. IMHO There might be other good ones but ?
I'm still new to NV so take what I say with a modicome of salt grains. Also, note that I'm older than most by a good margin so I need SPECIAL help.
I also have a T2 in a 1.93" Scalarworks mount. An I really like this height mount. Scalarworks makes a magnifier mount too, but I've not looked into it.
NEW! Scalarworks also makes some really cool BUIS. Really check them out. I picked up a set of 1.93" BUIS. They make standard height too. I've yet to install them but they are really compact and light weight and pricey unfortunately.
These are the best iterations of red dots and magnifiers I currently have. Unlike many folks I also like LPVOs. The most all around useful of these (for a reasonable cost) is the Trijicon Credo 1-6 second focal plane with BDC reticle. Its a simple reticle with good glass and its LIGHT. And I like doing business with Trijicon, I have had excellent interactions with their customer service deptartment.
I like 1-6x LPVOs. I like the second focal plane BDC reticle for its simplicity. If I need a no nonsense getter-done magnified optic, this configuration fits the bill. Most folks whine that the reticle isn't daylight bright... Who cares when you have an etched reticle? This is a magnified optic not a red dot. And the illumination is perfect when aiming into darker places or dawn/ dusk shooting. If I must have red dot speed, I'll just strap on a small red dot. So far I don't need it. If you are shooting competition maybe this isn't for you, but for a guy on a ranch and such this is a good optic. Would make a good optic on a trunk gun.
I also like my NF 1-8 ATACR (I don't turn the illumination on much except at low magnifiaction when te reticle is very small) , but I find myself using the rifle with the light weight LPVO much more often. I'm not sure the use case is there for an optic this expensive.
That is my quick and dirty take on current optics options.
PS. I like the old MROs (not the HDs, haven't tried them, but I would consider the Aimpoint Duty first.
