IMHO, to call yourself a face, you should take at least 1 rank in the Cha-based skills so you're not defaulting (Con, Etiquette, Impersonation [good for Phy.Mask spell], Intimidation, Negotiation). And the Influence spell would be a given for any mage/face for me.
Beyond that, I'd strongly recommend squeezing as many ranks of Focused Concentration (positive quality) in as possible. Personally, I'd grab all 6 for the flexibility since your houserules are up to 35 pts in positive qualities (and that it's so much cheaper at char.gen than later on); otherwise try for 4 minimum and sustain a Force 4 Increase Reflexes (or Phy.Mask or Invis, etc). Or all of the above using reagents to break the limits on several Force 1 spells.
A mage with initiative of 9+1d6 in our games would get destroyed. You simply can't act often enough. The F4 Inc.Reflexes would bump that to 13+3d6 giving you a decent chance of getting at least 21 and going 3 times per combat turn. Three times as much casting is potent.
Our group's elf shaman is as follows:
A - magic (rating 6, plus two R5 skills, and 10 spells)
B - attributes (20 pts)
C - elf (3 SAP); Edge 1 to 4
D - skills (22/0)
E - nuyen (6k)
attributes:
BOD 1 (+2) = 3
AGI 2 (+1) = 3
REA 1 (+4) = 5
STR 1 (+0) = 1
WIL 1 (+4) = 5
LOG 1 (+0) = 1... to 2 (w/Karma)
INT 1 (+4) = 5
CHA 3 (+5) = 8
INIT (with F4 Inc.Reflexes in Foc.Concentration): 14+3d6
karma
starting karma: +25 pts
positive qualities: Foc.Concentration 5 (-20 pts)
negative qualities: pick your favorite (+25 pts)
= 30 pts to spend during creation
-10 karma for 5 skills rating 0 to rating 1 (below)
-10 karma for LOG rating 1 to 2
-10 karma for 2 additional spell known
skills:
(free/magic) spellcasting 5, summoning 5
(22 individual) spellcasting 5 to 6 [and manipulation specilization] (2 pts), summon 5 to 6 (1 pt), binding 6, perception 6, counterspelling 6, assensing 1
(10 karma): negotiation 1, etiquette 1, impersonation 1, con 1, intimidation 1
spells (10 free/magic + 2 from karma = 12 total, which is max knowable for MAG 6)
resist pain, heal, manabolt, fireball, improved reflexes, physical mask, trid phantasm, mob mind, influence, analyze truth, mind probe, levitate
His Rating 5 Focused Concentration is very flexible, either one or two spells (like Force 4 Improved Reflexes and a reagent-broken-limit+Force 1 spell), or five reagent-broken-limit+Force 1 spells (like when he needs to cast Phy.Mask on the entire team).
All his spells proved to be super useful. Resist Pain is one of our favorites given that it becomes permanent, so you can buff the whole team before the meet.
His background/contacts are all based on detective-investigator-esk stuff to round out his detection/manipulation spells and face-ness.