Would You Rather Own A Good SET Amp, Or A Great Push Pull Amp?

It is regrettable that the one you really wanted got away.  But, there are a lot of fish in the sea, and perhaps you will find something tat you will really like if you continue to do what you are doing which is to search for alternatives.  Absent more information, it is hard to make specific recommendations, but, I have some general observations.  First, I tend to like low-powered tube amps, whether SET or pushpull.   SET amps tend to be much simpler in design, which leads a lot of people to assume that they are cheaper to build.  Indeed, there are a lot of low-cost Chinese-built SET amps on the market.  But, SET amps require the air-gapped transformer that Atmasphere described above and good ones tend to be quite expensive, so a good SET amp is usually quite expensive.

I particularly tend to not like the sound of high-powered pushpull amps that use a lot of output tubes of the like of KT88, KT120 and KT150 tubes.  The sound is, to me anyway, "brittle" (hard and edgy).  I much prefer lower-powered pentode and tetrode tubes in pushpull amps utilizing only two tubes per channel.  My favorite types are 6L6, KT66 and EL84.  The EL84 is apparently a very easy to work with tube because there are MANY examples of low cost, good sounding amps utilizing that tube.  Low-powered triode tubes are also very good in pushpull configuration although they still should only be used with very efficient speakers.  I had a wonderful sounding 45 pushpull amp that put out about 4 watts per channel.  My current 349 pushpull amp puts out about 5 watts.

Meanwhile, I am still heartbroken about losing the amp, and by minutes. Something almost certainly never recoverable from. Eight years of effort, and hope, lost all at once. 

Well, if it’s any consolation, I usually find that when I’ve placed a certain product up on the proverbial pedestal for a long time, I typically end up disappointed when/if I finally experience said product. I bet there was a strong chance you would’ve found fault with those amps in short order. 
 

I’ve still yet to encounter an audiophile system that sounded “perfect,” to my ears, regardless of price. This leads me to suspect there is no real “perfect” component out there either. Tube amps are especially imperfect IME. All of them have some rather significant shortcoming, whether it be noise, distortion level, lack of headroom, dynamics, detail etc… Same can be said for good solid state, but to a lesser extent IME. 

You might be better off with a class A solid state amp like the Pass XA25 or one of the wide heatsink Codas (5.5, 12, 16 etc). These amps do nearly everything better than much of what’s out there in tube form. 
 

@kevn I've experienced any number of sound stages over the decades, this both from my own systems and others. It's been a long term migration towards SET and horns, simply my preference at this time, could change somewhat as I continue to experiment with different amps. 

One should always be mindful that preamps, sources, rooms also greatly affect presentations. My DHT, fully balanced,  transformer volume control pre changed things to a large degree vs 6sn7 and 12 series tube based pre's I previously used. More recently had a Pass XP-22 pre, this made for yet another presentation. And then we have footers, racks, etc, we can alter presentation to some extent here. And then we have subs, adding a pair couple years ago, opened up sound stage to an amazing degree.

Poll Time

1 - Listen to an Audio System or Audio Device added to an Audio System,  making an evaluation based on Experiences had of the Produced End Sound

2 - Assess Measured Data Belonging to a Device/Devices followed by Listening to an Audio System or Device added to an Audio System, making an evaluation based on understanding of Measured Data and Experiences had of  the Produced End Sound 

Add a Category if felt further is required.

Poll Time

1 - Listen to an Audio System or Audio Device added to an Audio System,  making an evaluation based on Experiences had of the Produced End Sound

pindac - Top of the List - I trust my experiences had - I trust some not all with the Math, but don't typically require any data to support what is being produced as a Sound.