This is important.
It's 'easier' and 'more convenient' to run without Tor, however it is best to do so especially if you are hosting from home. A rented VPS (no matter how privately it was acquired) might be more flexible on how important it is though it's not a big sacrifice to achieve privacy.
A VPN + Tor is just a good way to add an additional layer to the system as a whole, though I don't believe this will make a lot of difference in regards to your node. It may require further configuration to prevent connectivity issues.
Don't run VPS. People are really bad at keeping their VPS safe and secure and are bound to make mistakes that opens up the attack surface. Other than the possibilities of misconfiguration, it gets worse by the fact that only one entity is likely to route their traffic to it. Hypervisors also provide little to no privacy to that.
VPN and Tor is pretty doable, Nord has it built in where certain servers are optimized for Tor. It just provides a false sense of security however, and adds little to privacy if any. Try not to use both at the same time.