My backpacking rifles don't have bipods. I want to have enough scope power to determine curl length from a good distance with my riflescope, should I get separated from my spotting scope. It's happend to me over the past 35yrs. Sometimes on purpose. Somtimes by happenstance. I want good quality glass so I can fully use the highest power on my riflescope. 10x maximum isn't even a consideration. And I don't limit myself to 500yds. So I want the additional scope power for refining my aim point out to yardages of 1000yds.
Farthest ram I ever shot was killed by luck, Davy Crockett style, before the days of lazer range finders. I don't really know how far he was, but my 280 RCBS Improved was sighted in at about 325-350yds and I aimed over the back of the ram what looked to be about 12 feet. This was about 25yrs ago. The 150gr Nosler Ballistic Tip hit the ram's front leg bone, and then entered his heart. I was estimating around 850yds, but that's all it was - a visual estimate. And that scope was a Leupold 2.5-8x VXIII. It was dumb luck, other than I'd already been pushing longer distances and had a good idea of the approximate bullet drops out to 600yds. Without a range finder, 600-700yds is a lot more difficult to master than with a laser rangefinder.
The farthest ram I've killed since the arrival of the long range hunting tools in the way of LRFs, ballistic programs, high BC bullets, more accurate guns and ammo, etc., was 730yds. No way to approach any closer than that. We waited 24hrs and 730yds was as good as it was going to get. In comparison to the ram killed 25yrs earlier, there was no luck involved at all with this shot.
So although I killed a ram a long ways off with an 8 power scope, I would never handicap myself today with a lower power scope for shots out past ~600yds. Especially with the availability of the 5X and 6X power magnification scopes available today.