You can buy a Sig whiskey 3 with fire dot pretty good scope for price.

IMO, one of the finest , if not the finest scopes for the $, are the lower power range VX-Rs . And of course Leupold quit making them.

Hawke L4A dot.

A lot of the cheaper illuminated scopes are made to impress in the store, but won't turn down low enough for low light use. Meoptas turn the dots down to nothing. Meoptas cheapest are the MeoSport R and there's one high magnification Optika5.

Leupold Firedots are hard to see around for me, but obviously that varies person to person. The also cost as much as Trijicon and Meoptas. The Leupolds are smaller and lighter, though. Some of the Trijicons and Meopta are huge. And the Optika6 are heavy.

Sorry for the book. I'm doing a lot of scope shopping these days.

I have 2 of the Vortex Crossfire IIs with the V Brite illuminated dot reticle. They are a 3-9X50 and a 6-18X40. I like it for late evening and also when the dot is not illuminated it is great for pinpoint accuracy on my varmit AR. The dot is the perfect size. Great scopes for the $200 to 300 range.

I’ve been down this road myself. Not many will compare the the fire dot. I myself have landed on Meopta’s. They make great glass and reticle. The meosport is ok, but I like the Optika 6 line and of course the Meostar is my go too. You will not have any flair issues. That sounds like a cheaper scope was used.