WHen you say AA powered, I'm guessing within a reasonable amount of AA's, but the Olight Baton S35 does an excellent job with 3 AA's. The S65 is even better with 6 AA's.
The Fenix is also quite decent in throwing, but the TK41 with 8x AA is just ridiculous and doesn't do much over 2 x 18650 while having twice the weight and nearly 3 times the size...
Do keep in mind that if you break up rechargeable battery packs, you have to keep them matched, so don't use 2 that have been charged for 20 times with 1 that's new etc.
For me 3xAA would be max. Beyond that LiION become much more practical.