I'm going to buy my first tube amp. I need honest blunt opinions

Depends how power-hungry your speakers are, and if they have high-order (18 dB/oct and 24dB/oct) crossovers. If the true Theile/Small efficiency is less than 87 dB/watt/meter, and if the crossover is high-order or employs notch filters, sorry, tube amps are not ideal. Class AB or Class D transistor with 100 to 200 watts is what the speaker wants.

On the other hand, if the speaker has a true Theile/Small efficiency of 90 dB/meter/watt, and the crossover is low-order (6 dB/oct or 12 dB/oct), then tube amps of 35 watts/channel look good. A pair of PP EL34, 6V6, KT66, or KT88 will do the job just fine ... that’s the vast majority of vintage and modern tube amps.

SETs with 8 watts or less ... well, you really do need efficient speakers, and 6.5" to 8" woofers matched with 1" dome tweeters do not qualify. The true Theile/Small efficiency of nearly all 6.5 to 8-inch midwoofers is in the 86 to 88 dB/meter range ... and the woofer, not the tweeter, sets the efficiency of the loudspeaker. There are no magic cabinets that raise the efficiency of the woofer ... the T/S parameters set the efficiency of the woofer, and the entire speaker.

P.S. More complex crossovers are sensitive to source impedance, otherwise called Damping Factor. A very low source impedance, or high Damping Factor, is the hallmark of big-watt transistor amps.

+1@gold prentice I am not confident you will appreciate any of the suggested components give your square room and setup. I would suggest moving the speakers closer together if possible and then moving your chair closer to them aiming for the golden triangle. Then do some room analysis to see how the bass is behaving in the space and consider appropriate treatments. This may yield far greater improvements than swapping out this for that. Once you have gone thru that process and gotten accustomed to the sound then start looking at the upgrade path. Just my 2 cents.

I haven’t read every post but the op decided not to buy an amp. He’s going to buy speakers.

@paulcreed I haven’t read every post but the op decided not to buy an amp. He’s going to buy speakers.

Missed that, and worth noting. Depending on what speakers are chosen by the OP, a speaker change could potentially open the door more for a wider selection of sweet sounding tube amps as well - if that's a direction the OP wants to go. 

Life is short, a speaker change is hard when you like the sound of your beloved speakers. I know all too well, and need a speaker change in order to do tubes right. then I will get a tube preamp. I have  a great sounding older mosfet SS amp