How to play a wolf head ninja optimally

Question

From Pathfinder SRD

Primal Cunning (Ex) While a wolf head lacks the focus and training to access a ki pool, he does have an honed sense of primal, animalistic cunning that allows him to draw on reserves of puissance and tenacity that border on the supernatural. This acts as a ki pool (and qualifies as a ki pool for prerequisites), but it contains only a single ki point. However, even if the wolf head expends this ki point, he is able to use tricks that require him to have at least one ki point. Along with ruffian, this ability replaces the ki pool ability.

My interpretation of this ability is that a wolf head ninja does not use ki at all for his ninja tricks, but there's also the capstone for ninja and various other abilities that require ki

From Pathfinder SRD

Hidden Master (Su) At 20th level, a ninja becomes a true master of her art. She can, as a standard action, cast greater invisibility on herself. While invisible in this way, she cannot be detected by any means, and not even invisibility purge, see invisibility, and true seeing can reveal her. She uses her ninja level as her caster level for this ability. Using this ability consumes 3 ki points from her ki pool. In addition, whenever the ninja deals sneak attack damage, she can sacrifice additional damage dice to apply a penalty to one ability score of the target equal to the number of dice sacrificed for 1 minute. This penalty does not stack with itself and cannot reduce an ability score below 1.

From pathfinder SRD

By spending 1 point from her ki pool, a ninja can make one additional attack at her highest attack bonus, but she can do so only when making a full attack. In addition, she can spend 1 point to increase her speed by 20 feet for 1 round. Finally, a ninja can spend 1 point from her ki pool to give herself a +4 insight bonus on Stealth checks for 1 round. Each of these powers is activated as a swift action. A ninja can gain additional powers that consume points from her ki pool by selecting certain ninja tricks

what I got from all this is that the ki system is pretty much useless to a wolf head ninja because most of the ninja features either require you to have at least 1 point left or use 1 point for activation. Furthermore the ninja class seems heavily focused around ki usage even outside of tricks. So that begs the question how do you play a wolf's head ninja given the regular ninja guidelines won't apply.

Answer 1

1. Take the Extra Ki feat.

If you don't like having only one Ki, you can get 2 more at the cost of a feat as many times as you like.

2. Buy/have crafted for you a Ki Mat.

The Ki Mat wondrous item allows you to recover your spent Ki with an hour of rest and a DC 10 Wisdom check. It's costly (in low level money and time) but can be the difference between enjoying your character or not.

3. Request a friendly Cleric take the Ki Channel feat.

Ki Channel would allow you to recover your 1 Ki instead of health each time your Cleric channels energy to heal. This is mostly beneficial if you also invest in Extra Ki and/or your party has another (vanilla) ninja or monk.

4. Have a planned use-situation for your Ki Point(s).

Decide on something your character cares about (getting an extra attack against leader type characters, on a Flat-Footed target, etc.) and only use your Ki in that situation. It will (hopefully) feel more thematic than gimpy.

5. Always remember the large bonuses you gained for your lower pool.

Wolf Head provides a +16 Fort bonus by level 20 and 20 extra HP on your d8 HD. The closest approximation to this benefit is 3 feats (Toughness, Great Fortitude and Improved Great Fortitude; even this doesn't compare fully) and access to 3 unique Ninja Tricks aimed toward successful Intimidation.

Answer 2

You can play the wolf head with tricks requiring one ki point left

However, even if the wolf head expends this ki point, he is able to use tricks that require him to have at least one ki point. Along with ruffian, this ability replaces the ki pool ability.

(Emphasis mine)

What I got from all this is that the ki system is pretty much useless to a wolf head ninja because most of the ninja features either require you to have at least 1 point left...

Your assumption here seems to be wrong - and it would be the main draw of the wolf head: continuous access to trick requiring one ki point, even when you don't have any left.

So you can capitalize on that by picking mainly tricks that are continuous bonus as long as you have one ki point. The wolf-head archetype basically transforms them into flat-continuous bonus.