I, like many, have been frustrated with most reticle designs in the past. Having started to design one of my own reticles, I certainly can understand the difficulty in pleasing every person and every unique situation. However, it was during the first parts of this ongoing design phase that I realized our differences are not typically about how the reticle is built itself, but rather how it fits our purpose and use.
There are some pretty standard reticle design elements that we all like to see. We may disagree on .25 vs .20 mil hashes, but we don't typically disagree that there should be neat linear spacing in our subtensions. Some of us prefer dots, some crosshairs, and maybe some open, but we all want an aiming point that is large enough to clearly see, but small enough to be precise.
When we think about designing a reticle, in my mind there are 3 broad categories that should define how this should be accomplished. This post is not merely my thoughts and meanderings but I am genuinely interested if I am on track or not, so hear me out.
These 3 categories are:
Dial
Hold
Hybrid
The problem with creating a reticle for everyone, is no one knows how you shoot, what your use case or situation is, along with various other personal preferences. If we break down these three categories, we can really start to fine tune our reticle to the end user. Just knowing which category our end user falls into helps to greatly narrow our reticle design.
Dial: In this use case our end user will primarily use the turrets to adjust for elevation. This is important, because we can put all of our information on our X axis and the middle/top of our Y axis and we can eliminate unnecessary holds and information that will obstruct our sight picture. A example would be something like the ZCO MPCT 1X reticle.
Hold: In this use case we don't plan on touching the turrets, so we need turret level information placed inside our sight picture at all areas up and down the x/y axis. This would include wind grids or dots. An example of this type of reticle would be something like a Horus H59 or a S&B gr2id reticle.
Hybrid: Here we want to do a little of both, but this represents a faster more dynamic reticle with more course values in the sight picture. The priority is on speed, but the option for precision exists, via dialing, if given the time. This would be your DMR style reticles. An example here would be your NF FC-DMX or your EOTECH SR5 style reticles, or, God rest it's soul...the LRHS3 "Gap" reticle.
Both the dial and Hold reticles are fairly straight forward, and in those we argue about subtension and line sizing, the crowding around our center dot or crosshair, how open the top half of the Y axis is etc. But we mostly agree those layouts follow a particular standard or pattern.
It is the Hybrid category that I believe gives us the most fits so I would like to focus my own personal thoughts on that area and get a gauge on how others feel.
For me, a hybrid reticle would be able to fill the following roles: Self-Defense, Dynamic Competitions (DMR, Gas Gun Matches, Run and Guns, etc) and Hunting.
- I want a reticle that is usable at the bottom end of the mag range, even if that aiming point is a course "circle" reference. This will aid in low mag fast stages in competition and low light moving shots on game. This can also be accomplished via bright and sufficient illumination.
- I want wind holds on the lower left and right sides of the x/y axis.
- I want my Y-axis clearly numbered (more on that in a minute).
- Personally, my preferred center dot size (if we are not using a crosshair) would be .2 MIL. I have found .25 to work just fine, but preferred it to be a little finer and have found .16 to be great for precision, but a little lacking on speed.
- I want exactly .5 mil space around my center/dot or crosshair. At minimum I would need .25 as I feel like the .20 spacing on something like the NF MIL-XT is too tight for the type of work these "hybrid" optics are meant for.
- On the Y-Axis, I want no less than .5 mil subtensions. I have found that I even like whole, 1 mil subtensions here. If I want more precision, I will dial, but my brain splits the .5's into .25 very easily and can even "quarter-up" a whole mil spread under pressure with no problem. Spreads of .25 or .20 here tends to scramble my brain under pressure as I look to count the hashes.
- In reference to point #3, I prefer the numbers on the vertical to be as tight as possible to the Y-axis, left side preferred (all else being equal we will hold against the spin more often and this pushes the number out of the sight picture). When the vertical is numbered in tree fashion, out beside the wind dots, my eye hunts back and forth to ensure I am holding properly. Numbers along the vertical eliminate this issue.
- One final thing I would like to see in Hybrid optics is wind dots throughout the entire x-axis range instead of in a tree pattern. I have had a manufacture ask, "Why do you need 5 mils of wind holds at 1.5 mils of elevation?" The answer to that is simple. In a DMR match with known distances where your targets are at 525, 650, 700 and 900, I like to dial for the 525 and hold the rest.
These above are simply my preferences, but I would like to hear what others think, specifically as it pertains to reticles in these hybrid optics that run anywhere from the LPVO to the "MPVO" physical design. My preferences assume an exposed and locking elevation turret with a
maximum bottom end of 4x and a maximum top end of 16x. What say you?
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