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I agree. I did spend decent money and got a great 'halfway' solution in the Roland blues cube, but it is too closely modelled on a valve amp. I could get some great tones, but struggled to get a consistent sound from home to rehearsal to gig. I still have it because it does sound great, but rarely use it now. I would have thought though, that Fender could use the Mustang amps as a basis for the TM series and just tweak it with decent components and speakers to make it a much better proposition with minimal cost implication, but to have it at double the cost for a 10th of the functions seems a bit steep. So my current solution (although not gigging at the moment), is the Joyo American sound, delay and boost on a small pedal board. But, following suggestions from @Kiwi, I am now trying rack mount system to remove all the variables and just have good consistent sound from XLR into PA or small powered speaker at home. Having the no-amp situation though creates just as much stuff as you need IEM or decent monitors in order to hear yourself, so not sure how much of a better solution it really is.

The price is the kicker indeed. For those of us used to buying non-tube amps at a much lower price, these do look pricey. I suppose the other way to look at it, though, would be that they're markedly cheaper than the all-tube original amps they have - e.g. c/f the 'normal' Twin Reverb with the price of the Tonemaster... so if the alternative was looking at those, then it is a saving. I'd love to know the cost difference to Fender in production and how that works in to their pricing strategy, given that there's still obviously R&D costs to factor in to the Tonemasters as they're fairly new, whereas the tube circuits they've been building for decades.... If it gets popular enough, I'm sure we'll see it filter down to more affordable options, in the same way that thirty odd years ago or more Peavy turned out their own range of tweed amps at a very competitive price vs the Fenders. The Vox 'nutube' tech is interesting as well, I'm intrigued as to whether that will take off. I don't know anything much about the tech and how it works, though giving the player the notion at least that there's a sort-of direct equivalent of the traditional tube in it might help persuade some of the 'four legs good, two legs bad' crowd. The other question of course is how long the idea of the traditional amp lasts for live use. I'm hearing of more and more players going the 'amp sim pedal to PA' route. The sort of Champ you describe could be a really great way of marketing that sort of convenience with the idea of 'authenticity' bundled in. What the really big artists are doing will, of course, reman influential...

I agree about the valves argument. I do like valve amps but can't work out any way to use them effectively at different volume levels, so I have always been drawn towards solid state and modelling for both the benefit in weight and also that once I set my sound I just use the volume knob (on both guitar and amp) to actually control the volume level and not just add gain. But, like @EdwardMarlowe I only use one or two sounds, rarely use effects other than on board reverb. My ideal would be similar to above. I really like the look of the Tonemaster series, but it seems a huge amount of money to pay for a modelling amp. A smaller Tonemaster Champ with a decent XLR simulated out for PA, 3.5mm line in and headphone out would suit me perfectly, even better if it had some digital reverb and a slapback delay. I do use the Blackstar Fly for pretty much all my home practice and it sound ok for home, so almost a 'quality/boutique' version of this that I could use as an interface into PA as needed would be very nice.

No direct experience, but I have my fingers crossed they do a left handed version of the 12 string Bendoline.