I guess there's tradeoffs.
I'll have to see how much of a shadow my flashlight makes mounted by the optic - although, a lot of the side mounted lights looks like they'd cast a decent shadow as well.
There are trade offs, but the further forward you go the smaller and less dark the shadow gets. Current trend is to run the light forward on the front sight post on ARs at 12 oclock. That both nearly eliminates the shadow and makes the switching accessable.
Whether or not any of this matters depends on the use you forsee. For those of us that may be shooting people it matters alot, range use only not so much. YMMV
misanthropist is spot on on the points I forgot to mention.
Shawn


















































