Discussion thread: Here (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=15638#msg275780)
Introduction
Welcome to my guide for the Shaman class. I know the Shaman class looks very weak for a full caster, but as it turns out he's got enough tricks up his sleeves to be surprisingly capable. My guide is here to show you how, but the short of it is that (Mis)fortune + Chant and access to three different spell lists make you a crazy good spellcaster. You may have noticed that the Shaman gets the Arcane Enlightenment hex which gives him access to Wizard spells. You may have written it off because of how ludicrously MAD it is. But, your best bet as a Shaman is actually to take the MADness on the chin and grab Arcane Enlightenment anyway for some drastically superior spell access.
Your best way to get your MAD stats high is to use aging rules, which are not allowed in PFS despite being part of the core rules. For now, the guide assumes no ability score modifiers from character age, but honestly you really should be playing a middle-aged or older character for a stronger Shaman, considering you are using literally every mental stat.
So, a Shaman's stat array, caster style:
10 point buy: 7 str - 10 dex - 10 con - 12 int - 16 wis - 12 cha
15 point buy: 7 str - 12 dex - 12 con - 13 int - 16 wis - 12 cha
20 point buy: 7 str - 9 dex - 10 con - 13 int - 18 wis - 14 cha
20 point buy: 7 str - 9 dex - 12 con - 13 int - 16 wis - 16 cha
20 point buy: 7 str - 12 dex - 12 con - 14 int - 16 wis - 14 cha
25 point buy: 7 str - 12 dex - 12 con - 13 int - 18 wis - 14 cha
Time to answer some basic concerns about this build's weak defenses: For AC, consider running around in heavy armor and a tower shield (this will exceed your heavy encumbrance limit unless you have the muscle of the society combat trait and a masterwork backpack for +3 str for carrying capacity purposes). Divine spells don't suffer arcane spell failure, so as long as you don't use attack rolls (including spells with attack rolls), you won't care about the lack of proficiency. For health, you should probably start with a Toad familiar (+3 hitpoints). Later on you should probably get an Improved Familiar with fast healing and the Protector archetype. If you're using the human favored class bonus, you should use the first two levels to pump health instead of getting cleric orisons. And get ready to buy a Belt of Mighty Constitution. If you want more starting health, you may want to get the Tribal Scars feat (EDIT Note: Nerfed by errata.) at level 1 since it gives you +6 health and your choice of perks (Raptorscale gives you +5 movespeed, Ice Chasm gives +1 reflex, bearpelt gives you +1 fortitude, etc - oh and they give skill bonuses too). For initiative, you may be interested in taking a +2 initiative trait like the Reactionary combat trait, but if you already took Muscle of the Society combat trait, then consider taking the Adopted social trait into Elven Reflexes / Warrior of Old race trait (+2 initiative again) or taking the Hermean Paragon region traits. Alternatively you can take the Survivor region trait (funnily enough, no region specified) which gives +1 to initiative, +1 to sense motive, and makes sense motive a class skill (Shamans do not get this skill).
If you are content with only one spell from Arcane Enlightenment, you can shore up defense stats instead, but you do get a much smaller Wizard spell selection each day.
Caster style:
10 point buy: 7 str - 8 dex - 10 con - 13 int - 18 wis - 7 cha
15 point buy: 7 str - 10 dex - 13 con - 13 int - 18 wis - 7 cha
20 point buy: 7 str - 13 dex - 14 con - 13 int - 18 wis - 7 cha
Martial style:
10 point buy: 12 str - 12 dex - 12 con - 13 int - 14 wis - 7 cha
15 point buy: 12 str - 12 dex - 12 con - 13 int - 16 wis - 7 cha
20 point buy: 14 str - 13 dex - 13 con - 13 int - 16 wis - 7 cha
If you decide to give up Arcane Enlightenment, stats become much easier but you give up your best spellcasting perks on a caster with the worst list of all casters.
Caster style:
10 point buy: 7 str - 10 dex - 14 con - 7 int - 18 wis - 7 cha
15 point buy: 7 str - 14 dex - 14 con - 7 int - 18 wis - 7 cha
20 point buy: 7 str - 14 dex - 16 con - 7 int - 18 wis - 7 cha
Martial style:
10 point buy: 14 str - 10 dex - 13 con - 7 int - 16 wis - 7 cha
15 point buy: 16 str - 10 dex - 13 con - 7 int - 16 wis - 7 cha
20 point buy: 16 str - 13 dex - 14 con - 7 int - 16 wis - 7 cha
For martial tricks, it's also possible to go for an AoO build with the Witch's Prehensile Hair hex (Wis-based for Shamans) instead of investing in strength and taking advantage of the fact that if you only have 1 natural attack it's always treated as a primary natural attack doing damage at 1½ your bonus (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/monsters/universalMonsterRules.html#natural-attacks). Which is a lot less painful than investing in Strength for a MAD caster like the Shaman, plus you'd have an attack that threatens at both 5 feet and 10 feet. The downside is spending a standard action to activate Prehensile Hair and investing your only Witch hex into obtaining it. But Prehensile Hair does give you an extra hand with which to activate magic items.
Also, if people insist on roleplaying mental stats, I would note that 7 int does not in fact make you a drooling retard. In Pathfinder, 3 int makes you an intelligent creature, so you still have quite a ways to fall before your character is THAT dumb, and 16+ wis would mean your character is very sensible.
A Shaman's Favorite Races
Races With Human Favored Class Bonus
They give Wis and let you cast Cleric spells, fixing up a severely damaged spell list. Speaking of the favored class bonus, it's time to clear something up:
Question: The favored class bonus lets me prepare Cleric spells, right?
No. The human favored class bonus adds "spells known." Prepared divine casters do not have or use a "spells known" mechanic. Otherwise almost all Clerics and Druids would be running around with Eldritch Heritage (Arcane) for an Arcane Bond to cast their entire spell list spontaneously. This debate has been played out definitively many times over. Only spontaneous divine casters have a "spells known" mechanic. So, you can only cast these Cleric spells with your Spirit Magic feature, the spontaneous slots. However, the Fluid Magic hex from the Water spirit will let you prepare Spirit Magic spells in regular slots, so you can prepare Cleric spells that way. It's come to my attention that the FAQ here (http://paizo.com/paizo/faq/v5748nruor1fm#v5748eaic9s54) indicates that any spell added to your list of spells known by a class feature is also added to your class list. (We are assuming that favored class bonuses count as class features because otherwise the entire favored class bonus would be unusable under this FAQ.) That would mean you could prepare these Cleric spells not because they are spells known, but because becoming spells known also adds them to your class list. Whether or not one can also cast Cleric spells known from the spontaneous Spirit Magic slots (seeing as for divine spellcasters spells known means spontaneous spellcasting) is a bit of a quandary given that you can also prepare them through class slots. At least if your Shaman gets an Arcane Bond like a Sorcerer (Speaker of the Past Shaman with Eldritch Heritage (Arcane) for instance), you could cast any of your spells known with it, meaning the Cleric spells, but perhaps not your class spells, and perhaps not the ordinary Spirit Magic spells either.
If you want my rambling explanation for how I missed that FAQ, I've been somewhat inconsistent in my applications of these new rules rewrites/"reinterpretations" paizo likes to do because usually they're just awful ways to indirectly nerf specific feats/tricks they obviously had in mind and if you truly try to apply these newfound general principles as universally as they claim them to be, you will find out that the new rulings break old content and sometimes even new content (yes, seriously - turns out paizo's own designers don't really keep up with their own rules changes and publish technically broken content every so often that relies on the old rulings to function) that were clearly not intended that way, so 9 times out of 10 I prefer to figure out which use cases that ruling was actually intended to curb, and apply the ruling (or rather, its intended nerf) to just those. It's pretty clear for instance that this ruling was really just meant to curb the combo of Greater Eldritch Heritage (Arcane) with Paragon Surge (they nerfed Paragon Surge in another FAQ, then just made it a proper errata for once) which was very popular among Oracles rather than ruin the Daivrat prestige class and Dreamed Secrets feat and the second evangelist boon of Deific Obedience (Urgathoa) for spontaneous casters while letting prepared casters continue enjoying cross-list spell access, since they cast with prepared spells, not spell slots, and mechanics that intend to apply to both, like the Preferred Spell and Theurgy feat, tend to explicitly call out "prepared spell or spell slot." Depending on your perspective this might be too pedantic of a reading, but PF itself doesn't shy from odd pedantic rulings (http://paizo.com/paizo/faq/v5748nruor1fm#v5748eaic9qd6) either so whether or not you are supposed to parse rules in a more formal or loose fashion can be uncertain like that. Personally I tend to prefer ruling by RAW because it's more predictable and clear-cut ("Did it say X? No? Then it's not X.") whereas RAI can be a real guessing (and arguing) game, unless of course the RAI is clear-cut and RAW leads to dysfunctional mechanics. Now, I'm fairly certain in that example Jason Bulmahn was just nerfing the Cleave feat by making up rules minutiae so he can avoid calling it an errata since PF likes to nerf a lot of mechanics with creative rules re-interpretations and "clarifications" that way, but at the same time sometimes they also want you to treat the ruling as a totally real principle even if they forget it half the time they make new content, so issues abound. That said, I'm pretty sure even PFS will rule that the Daivrat prestige class lets you cast spells from other classes though because of how very explicitly that was intended, but you might want to expect table variation now (as for the Dreamed Secrets feat, it is indirectly banned in PFS - the feat isn't banned, but all of the gods in its prerequisite are). So I guess we're just having it both ways now. As for the Cleric spells added as spells known to Shamans, I don't think this was one of those cases of design marching on. I'm pretty sure the designer just had a superficial understanding of the game mechanics and just thought of "spells known" as generically meaning "spells you can cast" without considering the mechanical implications of his language.
On to the races...
Aasimar (https://www.aonprd.com/RacesDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Aasimar): Scion of Humanity alternate racial trait makes him count as a human. +2 Wis boosts DCs and +2 Cha gives an extra spell with Arcane Enlightenment. Very good pick all around. You can also go Archon-Blooded (+2 Con, +2 Wis / Intimidate, Sense Motive / continual flame) or Garuda-Blooded (+2 Dex, +2 Wis / Acrobatics, Fly / see invisibility). The +2 Dex from Garuda-Blooded has some use for a reach Shaman build (equip reach weapon or use Prehensile Hair and get Combat Reflexes, then just cast spells while your AoOs do in enemies). Owing to the Shaman's MADness, +2 Cha is more valuable than normal. Additionally, you can replace the racial SLA with Lesser Age Resistance which is very useful if you are playing a middle-aged or older character for bonuses to mental stats.
Human (https://www.aonprd.com/RacesDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Human): Bonus feat is good and extra skill ranks are nice. Not much else to say. It's always a good pick, especially if you're feeling feat-starved. You could also trade Skilled for Fey Magic, Fey Thoughts, and Low-light vision (yes, all three). For Fey Thoughts I would strongly recommend taking Perception and Sense Motive as class skills (yes, seriously, the Shaman does not have them). For Fey Magic, take your pick, but the only druid orisons (0-level spells) that aren't on the Shaman list are Spark, Flare, Sign of the Dawnflower (if you worship Sarenrae), and Enhanced Diplomacy. Spark is situational at best (use cave terrain to light a torch, I guess?) and Flare is worthless though. Enhanced Diplomacy works best with urban terrain (silly, I know, but you can use urban as your fey magic terrain type). For the 1st-level spell I mostly recommend picking something not on the Shaman spell list (or Cleric, if using favored class bonus on it, or Wizard, if using Arcane Enlightenment hex). If you picked urban terrain, you may as well grab Whispering Lore for +4 to Knowledge (Local) checks, I guess. That bonus should stay useful.
Half-Elf (https://www.aonprd.com/RacesDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Half-Elf): Skill Focus is not bad (esp. if you need it as a prereq). Paragon Surge is still a goddamn amazing spell (not on your class list but who cares, with the favored class bonus at level 7 or the Arcane Enlightenment hex you can and most definitely should nab Paragon Surge anyway). You can also trade the Skill Focus (which is probably going in Perception) for Dual-Minded (+2 Will saves) or even a weapon proficiency if you're going martial Shaman. Multitalented perk is thoroughly useless and as such I recommend swapping it out for Fey Thoughts and picking up Sense Motive and Perception as class skills or taking Blended View for darkvision.
Half-Orc (https://www.aonprd.com/RacesDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Half-Orc): You're down a feat and you don't get Paragon Surge, but you do get Orc Ferocity (you still get 1 turn of staggered combat when reduced below 0, very good for spellcasters) which you can also instead trade for Sacred Tattoo (+1 luck to all saves, combine it with Fate's Favored faith trait for +2 luck instead; also very good, but does not stack with Luckstone). Aside from that you can trade Intimidating for Shaman's Apprentice and pick up an Endurance feat, and you can trade weapon familiarity for Fey Thoughts to pick up Sense Motive and Perception. And you can trade Darkvision for Skilled or Vigilant Gaze. All told, the Half-Orc is one of the weaker options here, but he does have some perks. More of a flavor pick
Tiefling (https://www.aonprd.com/RacesDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Tiefling): You'll want the Pass for Human alternate racial trait to obtain access to the human favored class bonus (which sadly locks you out of prehensile tail, and numerous other traits), and you should generally pick the Hellspawn variant (+2 Con, +2 Wis, -2 Cha / Diplomacy, Sense Motive / pyrotechnics). For a more martially inclined Shaman, you would want Hungerseed (+2 Str, +2 Wis, -2 Cha / Disguise, Intimidate / alter self). The only real reason to pick Tiefling is for +2 Str as a martial Shaman. It's probably tempting to kick out the Pass for Human (and human favored class bonus) as a martial Shaman to take those alternate racial traits, but if you do, you won't be able to cast Divine Favor.
Vanara (https://www.aonprd.com/RacesDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Vanara): No access to the human favored class bonus, but the Vanara has the same FCB. Dex, wisdom, prehensile tail, and low light vision are all good things, and the bonus to acrobatics and stealth are neat, but the charisma penalty will likely restrict your Arcane Enlightenment hex to only a single spell.
No Human Favored Class Bonus, but Wis and Sick Perks
Samsaran (https://www.aonprd.com/RacesDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Samsaran): Mystic Past Life alternate racial trait more than makes up for the lack of Human favored class bonus. You could use this to add Cleric spells to your Shaman list right away, or Druid spells for that matter, but I would sooner recommend pilfering the Inquisitor or Hunter list for some discounted goodies. The +2 int can also translate into a +2 cha if you swap around base stats from 14 int 12 cha to 12 int 14 cha which will pick up an extra spell with Arcane Enlightenment.
Svirfneblin (https://www.aonprd.com/RacesDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Svirfneblin): Ouch. Not only do you lose out on the spell selection from the favored class bonus, but your Arcane Enlightenment hex is crippled to one spell at a whopping -4 Charisma. On the other hand, you do get: +2 to all saves (and another +1 to reflex from dex and +1 to will from wis); +2 dodge to AC from a Defensive Training that applies to everything (oh, and another +2 AC from dex and small size); 11+Level Spell Resistance (you can make it 12+Level if you take the Scorned by Magic (https://www.aonprd.com/TraitDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Scorned%20by%20Magic) magic trait); constant nondetection; 1day - blindness/deafness, blur, disguise self; +1 to all your illusion spell DCs (Excellent if you prestige into Veiled Illusionist (https://www.aonprd.com/PrestigeClassesDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Veiled%20Illusionist)) on top of your +2 Wis; +2 Stealth (+4 underground) plus another +4 from Size (and another +1 from +2 dex); +2 to Perception (on top of the Stonecunning and your Wis bonus, yes); +2 Craft (Alchemy) - why not, helps if you take the Witch's Cauldron hex; Stonecunning (+2 bonus on Perception checks to notice unusual stonework and your GM has to automatically roll for you whenever you are within 10 feet of such stonework); 120 foot Darkvision and Low-light vision without any light sensitivity; +1 attack from small size; oh, and a +1 Hatred attack bonus against Dwarves and reptilians. In addition to that, you are still a Gnome so you do get the Gnome favored class bonus (+1/6 bonus hex, good for any Shaman, but Unsworn Shaman in particular). And you could conceivably take Improved Unarmed Strike (https://www.aonprd.com/FeatDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Improved%20Unarmed%20Strike) and Earth Child Style (https://www.aonprd.com/FeatDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Earth%20Child%20Style) to boost your Defensive Training to +6 AC (did we mention Svirfneblin Defensive Training applies to everything?) but that's 2 feats for +4 AC which isn't the highest priority for a Shaman. Then again if you do do this you can also ignore proficiency, attack rolls, and stealth to just wear a nonproficient Heavy Armor and Tower Shield for some absurd AC (they would need to roll nat 20s to hit you).
Other races
You don't want them.
Builds
Any Shaman can be played with a somewhat martial bent (though I don't really recommend playing a martial Shaman), but there are only three viable archetypes for a decent Shaman that I see.
Vanilla Shaman
The vanilla Shaman's advantage is that he gets a lot of hexes for a strong Hex build. He typically prestiges out at level 7 because level 6 is where he tops out with all the good stuff of the Shaman class (wandering hex and Spirit Talker prerequisite) or maybe 9 if you want slightly improved hexes. He uses the Spirit Talker or Ritual Hex feat for Arcane Enlightenment so he has a wandering spirit to pick any spirit he pleases for the spells, spirit ability, or hexes. Also, prestiging out keeps the cost of replacing your spirit animal low. I pretty much consider Serendipity Shaman and Overseer to be variants of the vanilla Shaman, since mostly they just bestow a variant of a normal spirit.
Unsworn Shaman
The Unsworn Shaman's advantage is that while he gets fewer hexes, he can flexibly reassign them every day, plus he can reassign both of his wandering spirits for different spirit magic spells, etc. Flexible hexes are extra fun to grab things like the Shaman Fetish hex (Craft Wondrous Item) and Witch's Cauldron hex (Brew Potion). He uses the Spirit Talker feat for the Arcane Enlightenment hex. You can prestige out at level 7 (level 6 gives 2nd wandering spirit and Spirit Talker prereq) but level 9 (level 8 gives 3rd minor spirit hex) is not a bad thought either. Speaking of the Spirit Talker feat, lets clear something up:
Question: The Unsworn Shaman does not qualify for the Spirit Talker feat, right? "Minor Spirit" doesn't count as the "hex" class feature.
Eh, it's open to debate. You can argue that Minor Spirit gives the Unsworn Shaman hexes, therefore the Unsworn Shaman counts as having a hex class feature. It's the same reason why a Druid with a Nature's Bond counts as having an animal companion class feature. Because even if that isn't the name, that's what you get. I don't think any GM would argue it's against RAI for an Unsworn Shaman to get the Spirit Talker feat either. EDIT: There has been an errata changing Minor Spirit from replacing the hex class feature to altering the hex class feature. The FAQ (http://paizo.com/paizo/faq/v5748nruor1gw#v5748eaic9vkp) confirms that this was explicitly done to ensure that the Shaman keeps the hex class feature while obtaining Minor Spirits (but he still only gets hexes through his minor spirits by default). This means it is no longer open to debate and it is 100% confirmed that an Unsworn Shaman counts as having the hex class feature for all intents and purposes.
If your GM does draw a distinction between the transient hexes of the Unsworn Shaman and the permanent hexes of a regular Shaman for prereqs, then there's another way to fulfill the prereq. In that case, you'll want to play a Svirfneblin or use a Racial Heritage feat to count as a Gnome so that at 6th level your favored class bonus gives you a Shaman hex outright, at which point you do have that bona fide hex class feature, solving your prereq issues. This is the best way to sidestep a rules debate and just get your Spirit Talker feat. An extra hex is quite solid for an Unsworn Shaman anyway, but you are giving up 4 cleric spells to do this. If you are specifically going Svirfneblin, then prestige out at 7 because your favored class bonus does nothing for levels 7 and 8, you've got that extra hex anyway, and you will really want to prestige out for more casting options since a Svirfneblin does not get Cleric spells and only adds 1 wizard spell to his preparation list each day, unless you're using Pearls of Power to restore Wizard spells from previous days.
If you play an Unsworn Shaman, be sure to get the Spirit Talker feat. Otherwise the archetype is trash since you're hex-starved and probably just going to spend a wandering and minor spirit to get Arcane Enlightenment at which point with 1 minor spirit hex and 1 wandering spirit remaining you're just a severely crippled vanilla Shaman (who would just use Spirit Talker for his Arcane Enlightenment leaving him the same 1 wandering spirit and 1 wandering hex in addition to the Spirit and hexes he got from class levels).
Speaker for the Past Shaman
This Shaman still gets his class hexes, Spirit, plus two Oracle mysteries (Ancestor and Time, spells included) and uses Spirit Talker for Arcane Enlightenment. It is the only Shaman that might seriously consider single-classing as a Shaman (which also progresses the favored class bonus for Cleric spells) instead of prestiging out, courtesy of Oracle revelations. Also the Ancestor mystery has more features for a martially inclined Shaman.
Stone
A solid spirit worth considering as your main spirit, particularly if you are building a high-level character.
Spells- Magic Stone: On your class list.
- Stone Call: No save for 2d6 damage and converting 40 feet of terrain into difficult terrain, not bad.
- Meld into Stone: Not a very good spell. Better for hiding and spying. While Meld into Stone normally stops sight, the Crystal Sight hex would allow you to see from inside the stone.
- Wall of Stone: Two levels sooner than your class list. One level sooner than anyone else can grab this spell. This spell would've been worth casting as a 6th level spell. But you can now make walls and bridges and trap people with stone as a 4th level spell, which is excellent.
- Stoneskin: On your class list.
- Stone Tell: One level sooner than your class list. Good for investigations, but situational.
- Statue: Out of combat buff which lets you spend rounds as a statue with hardness 8 whenever it's not your turn. You can also buff your party with it. It's a nice buff.
- Repel Metal or Stone: No save and pushes away stone and metal objects, including people bearing stone or metal gear. It even keeps them from approaching you through the line. Interesting and has its uses, but is a very high level spell for the effect.
- Clashing Rocks: 20d6 damage, knock 'em prone, and then they have to roll a reflex save or be buried (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/coreRulebook/environment.html#cave-ins-and-collapses) and take 1d6 bludgeoning damage per minute until they succeed at a DC 25 strength check or someone digs them out. Nearby enemies also take damage and have to roll saves or take 10d6 damage and be knocked prone. The damage is decent but it's the buried condition that's interesting. Safe to say you can't move or make somatic components while buried, so if you use stone shape and wall of stone you could make it harder for them to escape and air-tight to boot so they suffocate (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/environment/environmental-rules/#Suffocation) to death before they ever get out, or you could use it to hand yourself a few preparation rounds while the boss tries to escape, then murder him. Basically a reflex save or lose, depending on circumstances.
This list is worth considering as your main spirit mainly for the Stone Call, the 4th level Wall of Stone, Statue, and Clashing Rocks. Particularly the Wall of Stone.
Hexes
Crystal Sight: Limited duration is underwhelming but has some use for espionage and dungeon scouting.
Lodestone: It's a will save to reduce someone's maximum dex bonus to 3 and reduce their movement speed. Pass.
Metal Curse: Can't even cackle to keep it up. Pass.
Stone Stability: A +4 bonus against bull rush and trip plus Improved Trip at 5 and Greater Trip if you reach 10 for performing your own trips, which also gives you another +2 each to CMD against trip attacks for a +6 (or +8 at 10) total. Also useful for tripping up enemies with a reach build.
Ward of Stone: Would've been better with the un-nerfed Hex Vulnerability. As it stands it's a clear waste of a hex.
Spirit Animal: Unless you have a Protector archetype familiar (which you really should), this is probably not going to do anything for you unless you are level 16 and took the Nature or Mammoth spirits to make your spirit animal an animal companion. If you do have the Protector archetype though, then this is amazing, since a Protector familiar can split damage coming from its master as though using Shield Other, which states "the subject takes only half damage from all wounds and attacks (including those dealt by special abilities) that deal hit point damage. The amount of damage not taken by the warded creature is taken by you" which means the familiar takes half the damage (from the same source and type and all) as though he were targeted, and can DR and resist it with its own features.
Spirit Ability: It's a lousy blast and gaining corrosive isn't likely to matter so much at a level where Acid Resistance 5 becomes a thing. Still, free corrosive for your reach weapon if you're using that.
Greater Spirit: Free scaling DR/Adamantine is great. Also comes with a shitty blast component you'll never use.
True Spirit: Turn into an Earth Elemental for 16 hours and it's undispellable. You can use somatic and vocal components as an earth elemental and it's safe to say you can also carry normal gear. (Sure, it melds into your form while you shapeshift, but you can just remove gear before shifting and wear it over your shapeshifted form, provided it fits your new size.) You gain a +6 natural armor bonus and +4 constitution bonus along with DR 5/-, bleed immunity, crit immunity, and sneak attack immunity. Also, remember what I said about reach builds? As a huge elemental, you have just acquired very good reach with a solid boost to your strength. Downside is -2 to dex for Combat Reflexes if you want reach.
Manifestation: Acid Resistance 30 is cool to have, and the free metamagics on earth spells are good too, since earth has a lot of utility spells.
Waves
A good spirit to consider for your main spirit, particularly in aquatic campaigns. Even without that, it's probably worth considering as a main spirit for the Fluid Magic hex alone, although the spell list offers some decent utility and the Crashing Waves hex is not bad either. The level 16 Spirit Manifestation also gives you a great all-day, undispellable water elemental form, assuming your campaign lasts that long and you didn't prestige out for some reason.
Spells- Hydraulic Push: On your class list.
- Slipstream: It's a Longstrider that improves swimming speed and downhill walking speed, but the duration is 10 min/lvl instead of 1 hour/lvl and you can buff allies with it. It's good.
- Water Breathing: On your class list.
- Wall of Ice: Wall of Stone is typically much better, but Wall of Ice still has its uses. For one thing, you can make a Wall of Ice transparent. For another, you can actually get back to finishing off whatever you walled off instead of needing to bust out digging tools to break through the wall.
- Geyser: If you combine this with a Dazing Spell metamagic, anything that fails a save is dead as you can keep concentrating until they all die. Alternatively, with the Crashing Waves hex, it seems this spell will keep inducing fort saves to make everyone prone, which makes it much more useful. Otherwise, it's quite awful for the level.
- Fluid Form: DR 10/slashing depends on what you're fighting. +10 feet of reach is great for a reach build. Being able to pass through small holes and openings (which incidentally makes you immune to grappling) is also useful. Swim speed and water breathing work great in water but if you're seriously busy underwater you'll probably want the Water Breathing buff. Depending on your build and campaign, it's good. Otherwise, it's marginally useful.
- Vortex: On your class list.
- Seamantle: +8 AC, +4 Reflex, blocks line of effect against fire, and gives you a 30 foot reach slam attack which you should use for AoOs. It is good.
- Tsunami: On your class list.
Unsurprisingly the Waves list is much better for an aquatic campaign, but it has a lot of surprisingly good options.
Hexes
Beckoning Cold: A one-round entangle isn't exciting, but being able to extend the entangle with cold damage means that it has some use at early levels with Ray of Frost (which is not a class orison so you will need the Two-World Magic magic trait to add it to your list). Still, you're better off using (Mis)fortune cackles.
Crashing Waves: Add a caster level bonus to all your water spells and a free fort save vs prone if your water spells do damage. It's nice.
Fluid Magic: You can now prepare all your spirit magic spells into your regular slots. Yes please. Curiously enough, if you use this with your Spirit Talker feat, you would be able to retain spells prepared this way even after losing the Fluid Magic hex, so long as you do not lose the spirits those prepared spells are associated with. But if you are doing this, that would mean you are not using Spirit Talker for the Arcane Enlightenment hex.
Mist's Shroud: Blur for a single attack (or two or maybe even three) with a 1 minute duration. This hex is garbage.
Water Sight: Being able to see through fog and mist without penalty is essentially open license to abuse Obscuring Mist, Solid Fog, and so forth without suffering any of the visibility drawbacks yourself. Scrying is on your spell list, but at least you get to avoid paying for the focus this way, so that's useful. Greater Scrying has no material or focus component though. Incidentally, Shamans do not have the message cantrip, unless you use the Two World Magic magic trait to add it to your list or Arcane Enlightenment hex to prepare it. That said, this is only useful at low levels because at higher levels you can spend the hex on something else and just purchase Fogcutting Lenses (face slot) or a Goz Mask (head slot) for 8K gp for the effect. The Goz Mask is the better of the two, and no, the head slot does not conflict with the headband slot.
Spirit Animal: Mobility feat is pretty useless on a familiar. Unless you're level 16 with an animal companion, it probably doesn't matter. Water breathing at least reduces the need to divide your Water Breathing duration even further, so that's a bit useful.
Spirit Ability: Wave strike is not like to be high in demand and does not work with Crashing Waves, but at least it lets you move around your enemy a bit. Quenching at level 11 is a weak property for attacking enemies but a free +2 competence to saves vs fire effects is worth taking. Curiously, you can make any object immune to fire damage by wielding it as an improvised weapon now.
Greater Spirit: Free water speed and water breathing. A bit situational but good to have, and your familiar already has water breathing so you don't even need to buff yourselves. The cone attack is garbage but has a chance of being useful since it moves enemies 5 feet back.
True Spirit: Turn into a Water Elemental for 16 hours and it's undispellable. You can use somatic and vocal components as a water elemental and it's safe to say you can also carry normal gear. (Sure, it melds into your form while you shapeshift, but you can just remove gear before shifting and wear it over your shapeshifted form, provided it fits your new size.) You gain a +6 natural armor bonus, 120 foot swim speed, and a whopping +8 constitution bonus along with DR 5/-, bleed immunity, crit immunity, and sneak attack immunity. Also, you gain good reach as a huge elemental, and have +4 strength to make use of it. Downside is -2 to dex for Combat Reflexes if you want reach.
Manifestation: Cold Resistance 30 is cool to have, and the free metamagics on both cold and water spells are good too, since there are a lot of utility spells there.
Wind
It's rather underwhelming, all told.
Spells- Alter Winds: Extremely circumstantial, only alters wind conditions one step, and has limits based on caster level preventing it from being used in the conditions where it would be useful.
- Gust of Wind: This spell has 3 uses: Removing fogs (which you can also do with a level 1 burning hands unless you're dealing with a Solid Fog, which you can also remove with a less reliable and more costly dispel magic), messing with tiny creatures, and giving everyone a -4 on ranged attack rolls for 1 round. A rather limited spell, but it has its uses.
- Cloak of Winds: The tiny creature hate is strong on this list. Also gives a target of your choice +4 AC vs ranged attacks only. Unless you are facing swarms, this spell is probably garbage.
- River of Wind: 4d6 nonlethal + prone. Fort save for half and no prone. The line still remains to induce 2d6+20foot pushback+prone (fort save for half, no effects) on anything that starts its turn inside the line, so it basically gives you a 6d6, prone, and 20 foot knockback on something that fails two fort saves. The main use of this spell is just to knock things prone, which the Waves spirit can do better with Crashing Waves and Arcane Enlightenment hexes.
- Control Winds: On your class list.
- Sirocco: Once again it's bloody murder with a Dazing Spell, but you already knew that. Free fatigue regardless of save is good. If you can get someone in the area for 2 rounds, they become exhausted which is great. Prone condition on a failed fort save is nice. The damage is only meaningful if they take at least 2 rounds of damage and a DC 15 flight check is easy enough to pass that I wouldn't bother depending on that to do anything. It's a decent spell for delivering a variety of unpleasant conditions on your enemies. Just make sure your allies have a way to avoid the damage and associated fatigue condition (ie. cast Protection from Energy on the party, or Resist Energy if you're willing to take chances or use 3 liquid ices as alchemical reagents and cast Sirocco at a minimal caster level or CL12 so they are guaranteed to never take damage).
- Control weather: On your class list.
- Whirlwind: On your class list.
- Winds of Vengeance: On your class list.
If you hate tiny people and insects, this list is good. Otherwise, it's weak.
Hexes
Air Barrier: Armor bonuses do not stack. This is a waste of a hex until level 13 where the 50% miss chance comes into play, at which point it's fairly nice.
Sparking Aura: Electricity damage is low. Duration is weak. And you could just throw a bag of flour at something invisible to reveal it.
Vortex Spells: If you are attacking with Flame Blade as some kind of martial Shaman or using Spiritual Weapon (you'd need to be True Neutral or worship a deity like Sarenrae with a scimitar as favored weapon) and have Improved Critical (Scimitar), this might actually be useful. Otherwise, it's a trash hex.
Wind Sight: Ignoring Perception checks in conditions of heavy wind isn't relevant unless you are really fond of creating bad wind conditions for everyone else. Plus you can normally calm bad wind conditions. Clairvoyance/clairaudience is already on your spell list with a better duration.
Wind Ward: 1/day/target restriction, garbage duration until 8th level, and doesn't really get strong until 16th level (when you have much more important competition for your actions), assuming it even stacks with Air Barrier. Pass.
Spirit Animal: That resistance is almost never going to matter. It's a rarity even if you have a Protector familiar. And giving off light is a dire penalty to stealthing. So much for obtaining concealment.
Spirit Ability: Blast damage is crap and shocking arrives at a level where electricity resistance becomes a thing. Incredibly weak.
Greater Spirit: Just cast Resist Energy instead for the resist. The blast is garbage.
True Spirit: Turn into a Lightning Elemental for 16 hours and it's undispellable, as per Elemental Body IV. Except Elemental Body IV doesn't support a Lightning Elemental form, only an Air Elemental form, so I guess you're a "Lightning" Elemental with the air elemental statblock. You can use somatic and vocal components as a "lightning" elemental but you might not be able to carry normal gear since you're made of lightning and not air. You do gain a +6 natural armor bonus, 120 foot flight speed, +4 str and +6 dex for reach builds, along with DR 5/-, bleed immunity, crit immunity, and sneak attack immunity. You don't get any constitution bonus whatsoever though. But the undispellable 120 flight speed with perfect maneuverability is rather nice.
Manifestation: Electricity Resistance 30 is a nice perk, but the metamagics are less important for air and electricity spells.
Wood
You could make this your main spirit if you wanted (mostly for Verdant Path hex or maybe Spines and Brambles hex), but there are better picks.
Spells- Shillelagh: There are better options for playing martial Shaman.
- Barkskin: On your class list.
- Minor creation (wood only): 1 minute cast time and less useful than a proper minor creation, but this is not a spell on your class list. Has very situational utility, unless you are extremely creative with wood-crafting, but you will still have to deal with the 1 minute cast time.
- Thorn Body: On your class list.
- Tree Stride: This one is actually useful as it lets you locate your way through forests, hide inside trees, and teleport extensively, but you can't bring allies with you.
- Ironwood: More noncombat magic. You should almost always use half the size for the +1 enhancement bonus. Honestly at this level making wood items function like steel with a +1 bonus isn't that useful, but at least it has a nice day/level duration, so you can just apply this during your downtime days. More useful for druids who cannot wear metal, but a nice spell for your Wandering Spirit to use on off days.
- Transmute Metal to Wood: A very high spell level for some debuffs against metal-wearing enemies and reduced loot value. This spell is a lot more fun with Repel Wood, which the Shaman does not get. Overall, pass.
- Changestaff: Not on your class list, but the level penalty isn't helping. You can basically turn 8th level spell slots into hours/lvl treants, which aren't very exciting at this stage. Better if you gear them with magic items, but unlike the Wooden Phalanx treants, they are not spell immune nor do they have DR 5/adamantine. Generally the only treant you'd carry around would be a Liveoak you animated on a downtime day.
- Wooden Phalanx: At this stage advanced wood golems aren't much good, unless you take advantage of its hours/lvl duration to equip your wooden golems in a bunch of crazy gear.
On the upshot it has a lot of spells not on your class list, but overall it's still a rather situational and noncombat list. Has its occasional benefits for wandering spirit, but not a spell selection worthy of a primary spirit.
Hexes
Hex of Lignification: Fort save or target becomes staggered for 2 rounds and gains hardness 5. Still a bad hex. With a Ring of Ferocious Action, this hex basically gives a party member hardness 5 for 2 rounds which has its uses, but typically misfortune cackling an enemy will do more for preventing damage and ruining their ability to do anything.
Nature's Gifts: Spend a whole hex to obtain 1/day Goodberry. This hex is awful.
Spines and Brambles: You can make light undergrowth (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/coreRulebook/environment.html#forest-terrain), a type of difficult terrain, wherever you wish, providing concealment (20% miss chance for enemies, immune to sneak attacks unless enemies are Unchained Rogues or have the Shadow Strike feat, and you can stealth) and allowing you and your party (if they can also handle the difficult terrain) to run circles around enemies through difficult terrain while possibly stealthed. (Wisdom in the Flesh religion trait can give you Stealth as a wis-based class skill - Possessed Shaman archetype can get Stealth as a wis-based skill too, but giving up Spirit Magic for a few wis-based skills is insanity.) A less obvious use of this spell is that it lets you Entangle enemies anywhere by providing the requisite vegetation for the spell, which also makes this hex more fun (but you could just carry around potted plants for that). So this is actually a fairly good hex, as long as you make sure to max your wisdom score.
Verdant Path: Woodland stride's usefulness (or lack thereof) depends on your campaign, really. At-will air-walk as a supernatural ability (no dispels) you can activate whenever you're within 10 feet of a tree is pretty great if your party carries around their own tree. There is no target limitation added to air walk, so you can use it on the whole party to let them air-walk with you. On a side note, the text doesn't add any limitation of needing to stay within 10 feet of a tree to keep your air-walking active, so once you air-walk, you can just take off from the trees (or you could carry one with you). It's a pretty good hex at level 8.
Whispering Leaves: Very situational thanks to the limits. Whispering Wind is also not on the Shaman list, but Clairvoyance/Clairaudience is, and so is Sending. Very situational hex overall.
Spirit Animal: The freeze ability is only vaguely useful if you want your familiar to do long-term observation of an enemy in a particular area.
Spirit Ability: You gain a slam attack at the expense of dropping anything you could normally do with that arm, and it's limited to 3+charisma uses too. This spirit ability is terrible.
Greater Spirit: Black tentacles is one of the more useful greater spirit abilities. Given Pathfinder's ill-conceived combat maneuver system it's a lot more failure-prone though.
True Spirit: You should generally use this to turn into a Fungus Queen (http://archivesofnethys.com/MonsterDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Fungus%20Queen) all day so you can still use somatic and verbal components while picking up +2 natural AC, +2 size strength, +2 enhancement to con (which is useless, unless you somehow don't have a belt of mighty constitution by level 16), DR 10/cold iron or good (a +4 weapon will do the trick), and 20 resistance to electricity, acid, and fire, as per Plant Shape III. (Interestingly enough any plant immunities or resistances are treated as 20 resist, even if the original resist was lower). It's a good set of perks overall, although this one is a spell-like ability and therefore dispellable. You might want to invest in a ring of counterspells to auto-counter the first dispel magic to come your way.
Manifestation: You gain +4 natural AC, immunity to stun/sleep/polymorph/paralysis/poison (all of these can be very nasty conditions). You also have DR 10/- against wooden attacks, which is probably rather rare, but you could cast Transmute Metal to Wood (which is probably still a waste of a standard action) to change that. And you are counted as the plant type instead of your normal type for purposes of spells and magical effects. Being able to enter trees means nothing when you already have Tree Stride. Overall, the perks are somewhat useful. You could try to argue whether being treated as the plant type implicitly makes you immune to mind-affecting spells as plant type creatures are innately immune to mind-affecting effects (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/bestiary/creatureTypes.html#plant), but I would say the proper ruling is that you don't benefit from extra plant traits for purposes of spells, only that for the purposes of type-based targeting or effects, you are treated as a plant.
Archetype Spells and Hexes
Overseer Shaman
If you're playing a vanilla shaman and have a spirit with a bad spell list, this might be useful. It's worth noting that if you are using the Arcane Enlightenment hex you can obtain all of these spells through that hex anyway.
Spells- Charm Person: On your class list.
- Hideous Laughter: This essentially takes people out of the fight, especially if they have to make their saves twice with Persistent Spell metamagic.
- Hold Person: On your class list and this even gives you a level penalty. On the upside Hold Person would benefit from the +1 DC, I suppose. Better with a lesser metamagic rod of persistent spell.
- Crushing Despair: It's a save or suck with bad targeting and potential for friendly fire, and the suck isn't good enough. Not worth casting as a 4th level spell.
- Feeblemind: Devastating to arcane casters in particular but if you somehow manage to make this stick on a divine caster they will also be crippled. Arcane casters have weaker will saves and a -4 penalty to their saving throw though. A bit situational, but a good spell to have. If you have a method of inflicting int or charisma damage/drain, this spell can set enemies up to collapse into unconsciousness.
- Suggestion, Mass: How good this spell is depends largely on how clever you are with your suggestions. In the hands of the right players this can be a very powerful spell.
- Power Word Blind: The only good thing about this spell is the lack of a saving throw. But the duration is bad and the target needs to have under 200 health to fall prey to this and even then the duration is liable to be very short. If you use a Greater Metamagic Rod of Extend Spell the duration gets much better but you still need to gauge hp appropriately, especially at higher levels. If your GM lets you use the Heal skill to get a read on your opponent's hitpoints and you use Extend Spell it's pretty decent, but otherwise it's an ugly gamble unless you're confident in your ability to make it land and your ability to settle things with 2 rounds of your opponent being blinded.
- Irresistible Dance: On your class spell list. Can't help but note that Pathfinder nerfed the spell to add a saving throw to reduce the duration to one round, making the spell partially resistible now.
- Dominate Monster: Yep, dominate anything. Still, you have to remember that anything against the monster's nature gives them a second saving throw. If you used a metamagic rod of persistent spell you should be able to order people to act against their nature somewhat easily though.
Overall a workable list, but all the spells can be obtained through the Arcane Enlightenment hex. The stand-outs are Hideous Laughter, Feeblemind, and Mass Suggestion. Unlike the Serendipity Shaman, you don't get a Spirit Magic hex to also obtain the spirit's spell list, but if you're playing a vanilla shaman with a spirit with a bad spell list, this can be an upgrade.
Serendipity Shaman
The Serendipity Shaman makes a solid case for being an upgrade on the vanilla shaman if your campaign reaches high levels, but you will probably need to invest a feat into Defiant Luck since Halflings and Catfolks are terrible races for Shamans. Bear in mind that any race that counts as a Human can take the feat (like an Aasimar with the scion of humanity alternate racial trait). Defiant Luck is a rather awful (but not entirely useless) feat, but it does open up Inexplicable Luck, which might be useful (especially for crafting).
Spells- True Strike: This spell is terrible unless you have a special weapon that you really need to land on an enemy. It's more useful if you have a high-value combat maneuver you want to attempt, like Disarm.
- Aid: On your class list.
- Protection from Energy: On your class list.
- Freedom of Movement: A good out of combat buff and you can always cast it in combat if needed. Good to have. If you want to buff the party, you might want the Fluid Magic hex from the Waves spirit so you can prepare this spell multiple times.
- Break Enchantment: On your class list.
- Mislead: Not on your spell list and it's mostly greater invisibility with a 2 level penalty. In exchange for the 2 level penalty you get a free illusion (which requires concentration to control) and you no longer require a vocal component. If you can't get normal greater invisibility spells, this is good to have, plus it might waste an enemy's turn by having them attack your illusion.
- Spell Turning: At this level caster enemies or spell-like abilities should be rather common. A good out-of-combat buff. You might want to prepare it multiple times with the Fluid Magic hex from the waves spirit.
- Moment of Prescience: It's a pretty good out-of-combat buff. Initiative is an opposed dexterity check so you can use this to get a ludicrously massive bonus to initiative. You can similarly use this to make a Perception check to avoid being surprised, although Perception tends to be a strength of the Shaman anyway. Other than that it will virtually guarantee you pass a saving throw and can be of some use if you intend on crippling someone with a combat maneuver (like Disarm or Steal). It can also be used to sneak by a person with True Sight by giving you a massive bonus to your Stealth or Disguise check or relieve them of their possessions with a Sleight of Hand pickpocketing check.
- Miracle: Excellent spell, and a spell you will be very hard-pressed to obtain otherwise. Unless you're playing a Samsaran with Mystic Past Life, you're not getting this spell on your list otherwise. Unlike Wish, you won't need to spend 25k gp in diamond dust just to duplicate spells.
The high level spells are much better than the low level spells. It's also worth noting that there is the Spirit Magic hex which will give you your spirit's spells on top of the Luck domain spells, so if you're willing to burn a feat on Defiant Luck and a hex on Spirit Magic, this is basically just an addition to your spirit magic pool.
Hexes
Channel Luck: Interestingly enough, it does not mention whether or not you are channeling heal or harm, so it will default to how you would channel as a Cleric and thus depend on your alignment. Unless you're worried about your party's saving throws, channeling harm is typically much better, but overall this is an 8th level hex and you cannot qualify for feats with it, which is bad because the channel is only good when used with the Quick Channel feat, since you have better uses for standard actions. Unless you also have the Life spirit or Witch Doctor archetype (giving you another channel energy, allowing you to take channel feats as normal), this hex is really not worth grabbing since it would be a waste of standard actions at 8th level and beyond. If you do have the Life spirit and Quicken Channel feat (and presumably a good charisma score) though, this is a good hex to have. I wouldn't recommend the Witch Doctor archetype since it sacrifices a lot of hexes for somewhat weak perks overall, but if you're dedicated to channeling as much as possible it's an option.
Fortune: If you're chanting fortune there isn't much reason to need this, but it can be nice to have a 1/day (2/day at level 11 and 3/day at level 17) reroll as an immediate action. If you have hexes to spare, this one is nice to have, although you might want to get Tweak the Odds first, since it's more versatile and offers more uses.
Misfortune: You'll want a Rod of Abrupt Hexes to make this one worth your time, and any time you'd use this, odds are you'd be much better off chanting the standard misfortune hex instead. If you can land this hex on an opponent before combat though, it might be a decent prelude to a fight. It's not so bad, but really you have better options.
Spirit Magic: Unless you used the Serendipity Shaman archetype to cover for a spirit with an awful spell list (like the Life spirit), this is a good pickup.
Tweak the Odds: I wouldn't really bother getting this ability before level 8, but at higher levels this hex becomes surprisingly decent, especially since it's an immediate action so you can just fire it off whenever you need it. I'd like to point out that the example is badly worded, and at level 12 you can spend 3 extra uses (4 uses total) for a +4 bonus. While the lack of stacking with keen or critical focus is a pity, you can still use it at level 8 to let someone with a 20/x4 crit rating score a crit on a roll of 17. You can also use it to make a party member's saving throw succeed, if you know the roll. It can also be useful for an extra skill bump with the Ritual Hex feat and crafting, and so forth. The main problem with this hex is that its strength varies considerably depending on whether the GM likes to conduct your rolls in secret (not even letting you know he's rolling for you), rolling for you but not telling you your die result, or letting you roll for yourself. For some checks and saving throws, that GM discretion can totally change the effectiveness of the hex.
Speaker for the Past Shaman
The Speaker for the Past makes a solid argument for single-classing as a Shaman. It's worth noting that you do lose your familiar and wandering spirit as a Speaker of the Past, although you could use Eldritch Heritage (Arcane) or Familiar Bond to re-obtain a familiar. In a way I consider this a perk because a dead familiar will no longer destroy your character. For the record, it is a terrible idea to combine Speaker for the Past with the Ancestors spirit. I know it seems flavorful, but the sheer redundancy makes it a complete waste and the Ancestors spirit has terrible hexes. Just pick a more useful spirit to round out your Shaman instead. Also, it is worth pointing out that the Speaker of the Past Shaman uses his Wisdom modifier instead of Charisma for the purposes of the revelation.
Spells - Ancestor mysterySee: Ancestors spirit above.
Spells - Time mystery- Memory Lapse: Last I checked most diplomacy and intimidate rolls take more than one turn, so that function is fairly useless. A more interesting use of this is to just rob someone in one turn then make him forget what you just did. You might be able to use it to re-establish stealth but verbal components have to be heard. I wouldn't put a high value on this spell but if you're playing as an underhanded character there might be a number of interesting things you could get away with by making someone forget everything you did since the start of its last turn. If you want to get clever, you can ready an action to cast Charm Person on someone on their turn, which changes your initiative order to be immediately ahead of their turn, so after casting Charm Person you still get a turn before they can act again, and you can use that turn to cast Memory Lapse on them, rewinding their memories back to the start of their turn and deleting their memories of you ever charming them, assuming they fail to save against Memory Lapse. Readying an action for the target's turn and then casting Memory Lapse is the best way to collect both a standard action and Memory Lapse without using a quicken metamagic.
- Gentle Repose: On your class list.
- Sands of Time: One level sooner than your class list. Rather limited in its uses, but if you ever need to take on old people you can give them a -3 penalty to all their physical stats. Might be useful if your campaign ever has you hunting down and battling senior citizens. You never know.
- Threefold Aspect: If you ever wanted to go without a stat-boosting headband, now you can. The fun part about this spell is using it with an Extend metamagic. You see, bonuses with a duration greater than 24 hours count as permanent bonuses (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/coreRulebook/glossary.html#ability-score-bonuses) so you get to collect bonus spells and skill ranks. You'll still have to cast it every day and hope it doesn't get dispelled to keep the "permanent" bonuses. Still not an adequate substitute for a +6 headband though.
- Permanency: Not something you will be casting often, and something you could just obtain with Arcane Enlightenment when you want it, but at least it's a very good spell to have.
- Contingency: Another spell you might just cast with Arcane Enlightenment during any downtime, but still a very good spell to have up your sleeves.
- Disintegrate: It sounds great but it's fairly overrated. You absolutely need them to both land the ranged touch attack and have them fail the fortitude save or the spell is downright terrible. The more useful aspect of this spell is probably the way it can disintegrate objects and make holes for you.
- Temporal Stasis: Basically 5000 gp for a save or die. Once you have someone in stasis you can just camp around him and take your time preparing to take them out or leave them there and consider them someone else's problem now. If you want to take them out just go crazy casting nonstop buffs and summons, then dispel it and do him in with your army of steroided dudes. In combat someone else could just cast dispel magic on him and waste your 5000 gp.
- Time Stop: An excellent spell as always. Even better with an extend metamagic, but taking extra turns in a fight is always great.
The main draw of this spell list is Threefold Aspect and Temporal Stasis later on, assuming you have access to Arcane Enlightenment like any normal Shaman.
Revelations - Ancestor mystery
Ancestral Weapon: Unlike the Shaman's greater spirit ability, you can get this at level 2, but it's still of limited and dubious use overall.
Blood of Heroes: Now we're talking. A move action to self-buff attack and damage rolls, as well as will saves against fear. If you start with 18 wisdom (16+racial bonus), this bonus will last 4 rounds. Combined with a Divine Favor (use human favored class bonus) and heroic weapon later on, you can get some very strong attack and damage bonuses on your martial Shaman. You probably shouldn't take this before level 7 though.
Phantom Touch: I'd sooner cast Barbed Chains than use this.
Sacred Council: Another move action to self-buff. This one is a bit better for spell-casting than combat, but it's still a nice perk.
Spirit of the Warrior: It's the Transformation spell with half the duration, a free improved critical bonus, and you keep your casting ability, but you don't get martial weapon proficiency. At this level though it's probably pretty late to be playing as a martial.
Spirit Shield: Despite the name, it gives an armor bonus rather than a shield bonus, so this is largely a waste.
Storm of Souls: No. Even if you like blasting, the damage is plain bad.
Voice of the Grave: Thanks to its rounds/day uses equal to your level, you can ask a lot of questions this way. Might annoy your GM that you can keep interrogating after every encounter this way. If you don't intend on overusing Speak with Dead though, just skip the hex and use the spell when you need it.
Wisdom of the Ancestors: Free augury 1/day and free divination 1/day later on. The success rates are rather high for the level that you get it too, but if you're determined to have fun with auguries you might want to worship Pharasma, take the Messenger of Fate feat for a 100% success rate cap, and start spellcasting instead. You will have to cheese caster levels a bit though. Ultimately if you love using tons of auguries and divinations you're better off building your spells for it, and if you don't frequently use auguries and divinations you're probably better off skipping the revelation.
Revelations - Time mystery
Aging Touch: Sadly, the damage is too low to be worth considering at low levels and you will have better things to do with your standard actions at high levels.
Erase From Time: Probably not worth getting before 6th or 8th level, but it's a fairly useful way to take enemy spellcasters out of a fight with a single fort save.
Knowledge of the Ages: I have my doubts whether this would work with the Ritual Hex feat or not. Worth noting that as a Speaker of the Past you will be adding your wisdom modifier, not your charisma modifier, to a knowledge check, but overall this is probably a revelation you can do without.
Momentary Glimpse: Despite sounding like a swift or immediate action, it's actually a standard action to use, which makes this a waste of actions.
Rewind Time: Immediate action rerolls are fun.
Speed or Slow Time: Haste and Slow are both good spells you should generally be casting. They're not on the Shaman list either, although you could get them through Arcane Enlightenment otherwise, but now you won't need to.
Temporal Celerity: Boosts your initiative checks and lets you always act in surprise rounds. These are both excellent things to have, although if you used a trait to get Perception as a class skill and maxed it out, you shouldn't be having much trouble with Perception checks to avoid being surprised.
Time Flicker: It's essentially a single blur SLA where you can subdivide the duration. Blinking is generally terrible unless you want to move through walls (unless it's a wall of force, of course). A 20% chance of your spells going ethereal is awful unless you are casting self-buffs or auras (emanations). Blink used to be a useful thing for Rogues and other martials, but Jason Bulmahn flipped his shit during the pathfinder playtest when someone pointed out that any decent rogue should get a Ring of Blinking for guaranteed sneak attack at high levels (at the cost of random miss chance), and proceeded to nerf just about every single way a rogue could dependably collect sneak attack (including the Tumbling skill) that he could think of, because apparently he considered Rogues overpowered. (While he was busy freaking out, he also nerfed Quick Draw because people were using it with Rogues to grab things like scrolls, wands, throw tanglefoot bags, or sneak attack with alchemist's fire. I think somewhere he nerfed wands too so that they would have to be at least a standard action now, which ended up hurting the Ranger with his Instant Enemy wands.) And that has been your trivia of the day on why the Blink spell is worthless even for martials now.
Time Hop: Move action teleportation that doesn't provoke attacks of opportunity. Yes please.
Time Sight: Free true seeing is not that great, since it's rather situational and you still have to spend standard actions. If you're motivated on this point you can usually use permanency to obtain permanent arcane sight and see invisibility (make sure to cheese their caster levels to make them undispellable) which usually has you covered. Moment of Prescience and Foresight are abilities that normally last hours/lvl and 10min/lvl as very long-lasting out of combat buffs, so they're pretty bad for combat. Moment of Prescience on the other hand becomes a reusable source of giant bonuses to skill checks (assuming these aren't long-term skill checks).