No Africa experience, but a LOT of dark hunting hogs before night vision/thermal came along.
I have a Zeiss illum. And one not. All I can say is I rarely ever choose the illumination, but when I did, if I'd have had a single power not a variable lightness so to speak, it can get so bright it will burn out the target. I prefer to be barely able to turn illumination on.
We have RMRs on our pistols for hunting. Early and late the battery operated RMR is way to bright, it blurs out what I need to see on the target. The ambient light ones are almost self adjusting but we keep a piece of tape on top for middle of the day when they can get VERY bright.
Just a few things tossed out having shot so much at night.
And like DF said, IF you can see the target( in my case pigs) then you can see enough crosshair, though on a black pig I have to center vertical and horizontal bars but that worked pretty easy as far out as I could see.
Again, adjustable brightness... I'm sure they all come that way though.
