I have an LG Optimus G and I really like it.  Battery life isn't great but it is decent.  Really quick and responsive but I just broke the digitizer   Now I need to order another one which is around $80.  That Ubuntu Edge looked pretty sweet though.

Just because they failed to get $32 Million before the deadline, does NOT mean it is dead.

"Thanks for being part of the biggest crowdfunding campaign ever, and look out for Ubuntu on smartphones in 2014."

I don't mean to be rude, but maybe you should check up on it a little bit more.

My pockets are large enough for a n4 or s3. I think I am gonna go with the nexus because of the support by google and the active rom community.

I don't see the problem with Samsung apps crap. Just don't use them. Maybe they waste space, but with a sd card that should not be a problem (my Samsung doesn't support moving apps to SD but maybe the S3 does, idk). Also, once rooted, there is surely a way to get rid of those apps (my Samsung is rooted but as I said, I don't care about those apps, I just don't use them).

With a phone this expensive I'd rather not root it right away 

I am gonna check out the n4 at the electronics store. They have it up for display.

Yeah if you decide to root a phone, I would advise against doing it until your warranty is void.

Before I upgraded to the S4 my S3 had 2 day battery life playing music the whole time. If you install a custom rom and kernel then undervolt the phone can last for a really long time(stock battery). I really like the samsung phones, but without rooting I would much prefer a nexus device.
Also if you aren't having your phone continuously run(like with music) undervolting won't make too big of a difference as it'll spend most of it's time in deep sleep so need to risk messing things up.