I've been chasing down threads like this all over the place trying to figure what makes sense for me. What's making it hard is that I'm trying to find something compact, under $250, and either pure tube or something that takes pedals very well. The answer I keep getting is the VHT Special 6, but that actually might be bigger and louder than what I am looking for.
The problem is that I have some great smaller amps already, but they are bright-voiced, and it's tough to find something in a 8" or 10" speaker that covers my two primary needs: (1) Full-sounding; (2) Takes pedals well.
Here's the ones I have, all of which I can recommend at bedroom volumes:
Fender Super Champ X2 - Became my primary amp last year after downsizing from larger amps where I didn't need 85% of the volume they offered. It is a modelling amp, but also features preamp and power amp tubes, though people bicker over the semantics of whether the preamp tube really does anything. Who cares - it sounds great, with two caveats: (1) The stock speaker has some limitations. Not so much at bedroom levels, but you can put a better quality 10" speaker and reportedly get more volume and some additional low-end. (2) The models, overall, are outstanding, but for some maddening factory setting choices. There are 16 "Voices" plus a Channel 1 "Clean" channel that is still DSP, but runs very clean and feels much more "tube-like". Well, on Channel 1 and several of those other models, the default setting was to have Mids set to "10". Who does that?!? I actually didn't discover this until I plugged it into FUSE a second time, and now the amp sounds
considerably better. Great classic Fender tones, even at lower volumes.
Vox Pathfinder 15 - Really possibly the ultimate value amp (now discontinued, but still pretty widely available used for $130 or less), and one of the better solid state combos ever. The VOX voicing pigeonholes it to an extent, but it does that exceptionally well, and it takes pedals extremely well. So long as you understand that a metal pedal into a 8" combo with VOX on the front won't quite get all the way there.
Yamaha THR10 - Just got mine early this year, trading in an assortment of other gear. The THR10 is, by far, the most versatile piece of gear I own. It's covers clean tones of different sorts, plus crunch, JCM800, and even modern MESA sounds. It's even a passable bass amp at low volumes for practicing. It can be used as an external speaker for non-guitar hardware (I hook my iPad up to it and have played synths through it). It's a low-latency recording interface for PC. And all of it sounds great at volume levels that won't get you evicted or divorced.