From these two, Spike by far the favorite character.  Buffy, IMO, is too harsh and very often narrow minded in her perceptions.  Buffy comes across as self centered, as if the consequences of actions as they relate to her are what matter first.  When Buffy is being the great self sacrificing hero warrior, she can be magnificent and beautiful, but so many times, Buffy in the everyday world is a plain Bitch.  

Spike, has his own horrible traits, he can be selfish and demanding as well - but generally I find him to be very clever (before the decided to go with the dumbing down treatment) and much more knowledgeable about how things really work in the world - not committed to narrow world views or the dogmatic adherence to ideas, better able to see the gray shades between the black and white end points.  Spike, like Buffy, when he takes on the role of selfless warrior and protector is magnificent as well.  

Spike will always be my favorite character, because for me he is the prime metaphor of humans struggling to pull from themselves their best and most positive life forces - not to let the inner demons control their life.   That is why I will always be hoping for the best things from him and for him - because Spike for me is my idea of Humanity moving beyond all the hatreds and stupidity and ignorance that normally sets the rules and dynamics for life on this planet - actually, that is what The Soul in The Buffyverse means to me as well. 

Ooooh I loved Spike on AtS To be honest, I liked him more when he wasn't around Buffy. It hurts me to see him being so whipped. When he's by himself, he gets to be more confident and entertaining. That's why it took me a long time to become a Spuffy, Spike's interactions with other characters win me more than his with Buffy... until I started reading Spuffy fanfic. And rewatching the show. It does help reshape your thoughts.

I agree about Buffy, Tammy. She's an amazing character, so many layers, so many flaws, lots of heart and courage. A mix of good and bad qualities. And best of all, she's such a forgiving characters. I love her.

I'm a huge fan of those daring to show their hearts, so even though I loved Spike as a villain, my favorite character was Buffy for the first couple seasons, because she was so real and emotional and brave in how she loved. Later, though, Buffy seemed to lose a lot of her individual bravery about everything in life, not Slaying, and Spike became my favorite character of the two of them again. I admit that I loved his Love's Bitch speech and how often he seemed to prove it, and then how he moved beyond it. Spike has so much feeling about everything and has so many different facets to his personality. I was a little thrown when he popped out of the amulet in AtS and seemed like a huge difference in his character had come about, like all the new pessimism and quiet uncaring sarcasm. But then he had some really wonderful scenes, as if he'd finally reached who he could be, and some really funny scenes that were classically Spike's humor. I don't think there's a time I didn't love Spike's character, but it took until the later seasons for him to pull ahead of Buffy for me, and part of that was about how Buffy changed.

I'm actually someone that doesn't care for evil Spike

Oh, me too. I like Spike the second he got chipped, he was so much fun around the Scoobies in S4 especially Xander and Giles. My OTT (One True Threesome ) Xander/Spike/Giles.... siiiiiiigh