Are refractive or density based Brix meters better for use with alcoholic drinks?
Once I got going, this turned out to be a lengthy answer. So here's the summary: the alcohol will introduce a significant error in both methods. The density measurement will probably be closer to the actual sugar content. Th density measurement will underestimate the sugar, and the refractive index will overestimate the sugar.



Both the refractive index and the density-based methods work for measuring sugar content because adding sugar to water raises the refractive index and the density in amounts proportional to the concentration of the added sugar. As you and others noted in that thread, ethanol interferes with that measurement because it also affects the density and refractive index of the resulting solution. So how large is that effect?

To estimate this effect, I am going to restrict myself to the 15-35% alcohol (by volume) range you suggested. The charts I found for the density and refractive index of water/ethanol mixtures gives the ratio by weight; your range converts to 12-28% by weight. Pure water has a density of 0.99823 g/mL, and a refractive index of 1.3330. 12% ethanol has a density of 0.97910 g/mL, and a refractive index of 1.3410. 28% ethanol has a density of 0.95710 and a refractive index of 1.3524. Note that adding ethanol increases the refractive index, but decreases the density. I'll come back to that at the end.

This page gives a table of the index of refraction and density of sucrose solutions in water, as a function of the sucrose weight fraction. The 20 g sucrose per 100 mL solution is approximately 20% by weight, so that will have a refractive index of 1.3639, and a density of 1.0810 g/mL. 

The density and refractive index changes for both sucrose and ethanol are pretty linear over the range you're interested in, if you take them independently. Assuming that the sucrose effects and the ethanol effects are independent (NB: this may not be a good assumption), the refractive index measurement will be higher by 0.01-0.02, which corresponds to an overestimate of 7-14% sucrose. The density measurement will be lower by an amount 0.02-0.04 g/mL, which corresponds to an underestimate of 5-10% sucrose. So it looks like the hydrometer measurement will be a bit better, but the two methods will be off in different directions. It's a noticeable effect: depending on the method and the alcohol content, you might be off by somewhere between a quarter and half of your intended sugar content.

There is one neat thing you could do to take advantage of the fact that the alcohol moves the density in the opposite direction to the sugar. If you had a bottle of liquor with unknown alcohol content and unknown sugar content, you could take both the density and the refractive index measurement. Again, assuming the four effects are linear, and the sugar effects are independent of the alcohol, you could write two equations for the refractive index $RI$ and density $\rho$ as functions of the alcohol and sugar: $RI = Ax + By, \rho = Cx + Dy$. $x$ and $y$ are your alcohol and sugar content in whatever units you prefer, and $A, B, C,$ and $D$ are the empirical parameters describing each of the four effects. If you take a measurement for $RI$ and for $\rho$, you can solve for $x$ and $y$.

PS: to answer one question suggested by the comments of the [cooking.se] question you linked, density-based brix meters (I'm used to seeing them called hydrometers) are typically used for home brewing beer and wine because the only source of alcohol is the fermenting sugar. You take a density measurement before fermentation begins to get a baseline. Then, at any point after fermentation begins, the difference between the current density and the baseline density is directly proportional to the alcohol content. I'm sure the same reasoning applies to the refractive index method, but I've never used that for beer-brewing (I've only used it for my real research).  See Cutaia, A.J., Reid, A-J. and R.A. Speers,  2009. Examination of the relationships between Original, Real and Apparent Extracts, and Alcohol in Pilot Plant and Commercially Produced Beers. J. Inst. Brew. 115:318-327.