Edit: Personally " long range shooting in general" means a whole pile of different things to different people, and it's hard to give much good feedback without more specific goals. This means PRS matches and positional shooting at steel in a competitive format to some people, it means a lightweight hunting rifle that can hold little groups a long way out to the next person, and it means a f-class rig to another guy, and something totally different to someone else. This is why below I suggested you might think about not changing too much at the beginning. Just as an example, if "long range hunting" is your goal you may very well want a light weight stock, carbon barrel, etc to wind up with a backpackable rifle you can still shoot reasonably well out to 1000 yards...or if PRS is your goal you're going to want a 15-20-ish pound beast of a rifle, probably in a pipsqueak caliber, designed from the ground up for the attachments, weights, bag riders, shooting on barriers, clamps, etc that are standard in that game. Figure out where you want to take the rifle and what that'll take before you create a rifle that is too specialized to be versatile-enough to TRY the different facets of it.
You could do a lot worse than a tikka ctr in 6.5mb. At the budget you might have a hard time doing better, and you could certainly do worse.
Its acceptable out of the box for a heavier hunting rifle.
Its acceptable out of the box to shoot a prs match including magazines.
It's generally more than accurate-enough out of the box that the rifle will not be the wink link.
There is decent aftermarket parts support and good demand for used accessories…throw any brake on it, and if you must, for an extra $400 put it in a bravo that you can adjust, add weight, rails, bags, etc. Or just screw an arca rail on the factory tikka foreend and be done. After you use it a bunch and figure out what you really want and what you'll use it for, you can unload the parts you dont want and have your pick of stocks, barrels, etc that drop-in fit allowing you to reconfigure as needed to be a more specialized tool for whatever it is you decide you want to do with it….if it ends up being a match rifle, a chassis with gobs of additional weight and an MTU barrel in the latest boutique prs cartridge is an off the shelf purchase. Same with a hunting stock, carbon or steel sporter barrel, etc if it ends up being a hunting rifle.
For PRS matches you will definitely want a FFP scope with a milling reticle of some sort. Almost everyone at matches will be shooting a 4 or 5x-25 or 30x scope with a tree reticle, and most will use mils so it will be far easier to "speak the same langauge" if you get a mil scope as opposed to a MOA scope. Most folks I know do most of the their shooting in matches at 12-18x for better spotting of shots and faster target acquisition, and just zoom-in for smaller targets and when it makes sense, so especially as a crossover gun you would not be crazy out-gunned with a scope that tops out at 18 or 20x and has some sort of a reticle that allows for wind holds and holdovers across the xzoom-range. IMO you do not want a 2fp scope for shooting PRS-type matches though. The NF scope you mentioned would be a good option for this as long as its in FFP. At least for my eyes a lower-powered hunting scope (say 12x or less on the top end) would not provide me enough magnification for many PRS targets--not that you cant hit them, but zooming in to differentiate the shot-up steel target agsint the similar-colors rocks its agsint, and see small bullet splash in the dirt or vegetation I need a little more magnification, and that's also where the brake comes in handy even on a low-recoiling gun. Also, dont worry about being competitive, it's a game and just because you can shoot you'll still have a steep learning curve--just get some decent dope and then shoot some local matches if there are any close-ish.
