First off, I’m not trying to defend any manufacturer.
You take “a small risk” with any manufacturer. Do you think if any of the “more reliable” companies sold as many scopes as Leupold or Vortex they would have more failures that we would hear about? A 2% return rate for nightforce vs 2% Leupold/vortex is a vastly different number of scopes. Consequently we will hear much more about it simply because of volume in the market.
With that being said, I REALLY wanted a mk5 for my recent build because I think glass, turrets, weight, etc they are very very hard to beat. In the end, I just couldn’t do it because of the “small risk” you talk about. I ended up going with a 5-25 Atacr.
Interestingly enough, I’ll be talking with an engineer from Leupold on Friday. Should be a fun conversation and I’m very interested in what will be said.