Sorry for bring back an old thread, but I've been thinking about this recently. Does anyone feel the need for moonlight on a tactical light? Do you assume you will always have a second light that can handle moonlight duties?
I feel that a tactical light should have momentary max mode. Repeated button presses shouldn't change the mode. Think of the M1X Striker, where 3 presses goes to strobe. Seems like a bad idea.
Strobe should be easy access, preferably momentary. This is where a lot of the two button lights are passable but not ideal, holding the side button for 1 second gets strobe. Something like the D25LC2 Tac requires multiple twists to get to strobe. Still seems bad. Something like the Dobermann Pro almost works, but when the head is loose you could accidently switch modes out of strobe due to the 5 second memory time.
I think a tactical light should have a feature to get to moonlight, directly from off. Think of the scenario, where you step into a dark closet to reload a clip, etc. You don't want to have to jump through different modes to get a minimal amount of light. It also needs to be easy to get back to max and/or strobe. This is where most of the two switch lights fail. The M1X Strikers shortcut to moonlight seems ok, but then needs multiple clicks to get back to max.
If moonlight is important, the HDS Tactical or the Nitecore SRT5 interfaces seem ideal, but the Nitecore requires two hands to rotate the ring. The HDS has limited brightness, so the ability to use startling brightness to blind an intruder is reduced.
Thoughts? I'm starting to think of giving up the pursuit of a tactical light with both good strobe and moonlight features. I always have other lights near that could be used for moonlight.
