[General Questions and Answers] fiernaq:
Time for a new phone. What should I get?

My current phone is the Sprint Samsung Galaxy Saga II Epic 4G Touch (SPH-D710).

Preferences:

Battery life - this is the single most crucial item on my list. The longer the battery lasts, the better.

Customizability - would like another phone with the vast amount of customization offered in the E4GT forum.

Carrier - would prefer the phone be compatible with Ting (my current provider) or with another MVNO that offers low cost / low usage plans. I'm in the <200 minutes, <500 texts, and <100 Mb data category and don't want to pay for an "unlimited" plan that I won't use half of. Also, go go wifi. I'd like to see some 802.11ac phones on the list.

Screen size - max 5in unless there's a really good reason otherwise. I'd rather not need a man-purse to carry it or two hands to use it. Of course, I'm also not interested in tiny phones since I would like to be able to use RDP from my phone without it being completely terribad.

Global capability - I do travel occasionally and it's nice to not need a borrowed phone (I'm USA based for now).

Things that don't interest me:

Screen resolution above 1920x1080 - it's pointless on such a small device and just lowers battery life. Bigger numbers aren't always better.

Bloat - if the device doesn't have a trimmed down ROM available, I'm not interested.

Again, battery life is by far the most important item on this list. Don't even bother mentioning a phone if it can't stay alive for 24 hours stock. I've tried the Motorola Droid Maxx and it's currently pretty close to the top of my list with the only thing holding me back from buying it being the limited customization options (it OTA'd to 4.4.4 with a locked BL which from what I can tell means it would've been stuck un-rootable so I returned it).

Thanks in advance for your suggestions :o

edit

The E4GT is comfortable in my hand with dimensions of 5.11 x 2.74 x 0.38 inches (130 x 70 x 10 mm)

The Motorola Droid Maxx is mostly comfortable although a bit tall and it has dimensions of 5.41 x 2.80 x 0.33 inches (137.5 x 71.2 x 8.5 mm)

I'm pretty sure the OnePlus One with dimensions of 6.02 x 2.99 x 0.35 inches (152.9 x 75.9 x 8.9 mm) would not be comfortable for me to hold and while that doesn't knock it out of the standings entirely (I've actually had my eye on it for a while because it does look like a great phone) it definitely makes me want to know if there is anything better out there (for me). Also, from what I hear, the battery doesn't exactly fare too well (against what I'm looking for).

In terms of battery life, let me be a bit more clear about my requirements. I'll use the Droid Maxx as a comparison since I found it to be adequate. Yes, that's a tough measuring stick but it is what I'm looking for. Brand new, out of the box, a Droid Maxx that was immediately plugged in till full charge then unplugged - updates were run and apps installed and the device was used as per my normal which resulted in about 2.5 hours of screen on time with wifi, 3g, and 4g active the whole time (wifi was used for the most part but mobile data was enabled) and the Droid Maxx lasted over 7 days. Yes, that's abnormal. After nearly a month of use it was averaging about 3 full days. I know most phones aren't built to come close to that but the closer you can get the more likely I'll be interested in it. First three screenshots below show the 7 days figure. The next four screenshots show a much heavier usage scenario including over an hour of heavy duty gaming while still getting over 3 days out of the device.