What subwoofers are suited 4 audiophiles

Thank you for your inputs.
Was wondering, can I get away with a small cabinet sized subwoofer and still get that accurate smooth blending low frequency boost that I am looking for that disappears in the main speakers output?
I am hoping to get bass that sounds natural and life-like. At this point I am getting an incredible life-like sound with my merlins/apogee ribbons combo. I know it sounds crazy, I had the ribbons off for the longest time thinking it was wrong to use two tweeters, that was around the time of the upgrade of the tonearm with graham which was a TREMENDOUS upgrade, so I used the merlins only. Just the other day I decided to try the ribbons again and since they act as dipole I am getting that lifelike presence from my system that was even better than without the ribbons. It may be too early to say with certainty so I am not saying definitively that this is it, I am totally content with the merlins. They do a better job than speakers costing more, set up in show rooms. The merlins do get the listener engaged! And now I am hoping to add a subwoofer to blend in nicely. thanks

Was wondering, can I get away with a small cabinet sized subwoofer and still get that accurate smooth blending low frequency boost that I am looking for that disappears in the main speakers output?

IMHO, No! If you want accuracy at realistic SPL levels then plan on something with at least a 12" woofer, large Xmax, a beefy sealed cabinet and high power amplification (500 watts)....remember the sub has to keep up with your Merlins and it has to do this over the most challenging frequency range for a loudspeaker. ( A tweeter is easy, mid range is tough, bass is harder again, but extreme LF is the hardest of all)

They all sound completely useless compared to a larger speaker.

I laughed at one of the latter responses, that they are worthless if you have a good (large) set of speakers.

I am auditioning subs, and the latest one is an NHT SW3 with its amp. The guy might give it to me for cheap.

But with my Vandy 3's, the Sub was invisible, and did nothing to add to the sound, except when I turned the volume to max and increased the low pass to over 80. At that point you could hear it, and all it really did was muddy up the sound of the Vandys.

I knew my Vandys were good speakers, but little did I know that they made this sub useless.

Hard to beat REL in price/quality ratio.