Novelty wears off quick, and utility scales slowly with price, at least for the thermal. It’s like with real wrist watches Anything under $1.5K is a toy- or so it is claimed, I’m not into clocks, but for thermal shit if you want real gear you’re looking at $2K for the lower-mid range models, buying both thermal and NV is just not an option unless you have serious cash to spend. I got a great deal on the monocular, at $600, and for the price it was decent for a hobbyist, but there were definitive drawbacks, most specifically field of view and distance.

I did randomly find a turtle sleeping in a bush in the middle of the night in the jungle though. That alone was probably worth the $600 hahahahaha! Nah not really. But it was cool being able to walk on the beach and looking through the thing and see people hundreds of meters away completely unaware of me. And thermals tell you a lot about what people are up to. It was important for my security as I was living in the wild, kind of, but in hindsight I was never in any real danger, and had I been, I had been better of with night vision anyway.