I am looking hard at the Razor for many reasons over the NF scope. None of which because I am unhappy with the NF scopes, only that the Vortex offer many things that are not standard on the NF such as zero stop, FFP, +125 moa of vertical adjustment, labeled reticle.
As far as FFP scopes not being useful for shooting past 700 yards, I have to respectfully disagree on that one. I range all my targets with a swaro rangefinder so the reticle is never used for ranging. Anyone that would use a reticle for ranging when we have access to extremely accurate laser rangefinders are just missing the boat on how things should be done.
I have used ballistic reticle holdover for big game hunting out to 1400 yards and it works perfectly well. The trick is to develope your drops in conditions similiar to those that you will be hunting in. BY that I mean, do not develope your drop chart when its 85 degrees out in the middle of the summer if you will be hunting in 40 degree or colder temps during hunting season.
Best time to develope a drop chart for a ballistic reticle is right after big game season when temps are similiar. OR a month or so just before big game season. 10-20 degree temp changes will not result in much difference at all as far as big game hunting out to 1000 yards. Shooter error and wind judgement errors will make much larger differences then this will.
In fact I have developed drop charts and used them year after year and never had any problems at all with changes in environmental conditions shifting point of impact. Now I am not saying it will not change POI, I am saying it will, in nearly all big game hunting situations, not change POI enough to cause you to miss the vital zone of a big game animal. In most cases, you will never know there was a sift in POI as most can not shoot well enough in field conditions to be able to tell this shift.
As far as the reticle getting to big, well, that goes both ways. In fact, it does not get larger in any way, it stays consistant with the target. IF it covers 1/4 moa wide item on 6x, it will cover 1/4 moa at 20x. This in fact is a bonus, ESPECIALLY for a big game hunter. A very fine second focal plane reticle can get very difficult to see in low light. A properly designed FFP reticle does not have this problem. A poorly designed FFP reticle CAN have this problem.
To a more accurate discription of reticles would be the FFP never changes size in relation to the target, the SFP reticle gets smaller as the power is increased in relationship to the target or it gets larger as the power is turned down.
Back to the Razor reticle. IF your using the reticle for hold over shooting, the labeled reticle is VASTLY superior to anything NF has as there is MUCH less likelihood that you will get lost counting down the reference marks to find the correct hold.
If you want to dial up, your looking at nearly 130 moa of vertical adjustment compared to 100 for the best NF offering. Both are plenty but 130 is alot more then 100 meaning that for most of your shooting, you will likely be working closer to the center of the adjustment range of the Vortex then the NF which is always a good thing.
Again, do not get me wrong, I love the NF scopes and they are proven. The Vortex is the new kid on the block but if they are reliable, especially on the larger calibers and when used with muzzle brakes, they will be a steal with the options they offer.
I sit there and think about my 338 Allen Magnum with a 265 gr AT RBBT loaded to 3550 fps with a .920 BC and combine that with a scope that has 130 moa of vertical adjustment.........
