Almost certainly your problems began with a blown head gasket. The ticking sound was the compression gasses leaking out between the block and the head.

The blown head gasket dramatically increased the pressure in the cooling system, eventually blowing off the bottom radiator hose. Note that the hose did not fail, but was literally blown off the bottom of the radiator by over-pressure. This dumped all your coolant out in a matter of a few seconds, quickly enough that the engine did not overheat until the coolant was gone.

With no coolant, the temperature gauge did not register an overheat condition (the sensor needs to be immersed in coolant in order to work). At this point your damage was not extreme -- $1500 would cover R&R and resurface the cylinder head since it is an in-line either 5- or 6-cylinder, so just one cylinder head to deal with.

But if you ran the engine until it quit from overheating, there MAY be other damage to rings, pistons, cylinder walls, and POSSIBLY (but not likely) bottom end bearings. I'd say there's a 50/50 chance that you could get by with just the head gasket repair.

It depends on how much of a gambler you are and how much you like the car. Commit to a $1500 repair to save a $5,000 car with a 50% chance you're throwing the money away. Except no, the cost to determine whether you could get by with just the head gasket repair would only be $500-$600 labor to pull the head and check out the cylinders and get an idea of the state of the pistons and rings.

If it were me I'd take the chance.

tanstaafl.