3 life monk, starting on 3 fighter lives... advice please

[Marnin_Wood]

If you enjoy playing as a Monk, a 12 Fighter/8 Monk (eg a Godhand build) might be a good choice for your Fighter life.
If you want to just get the Pally past lives and be done with it, maybe either of 18/2mnk (revisied solar phoenix), or 1Arty/9Monk/10 Pally (in that order; no kidding, a guildmate of mine is actually TRing on that for his second time).

I love Arties, my other TR toon is an Arti, but I'm holding her at her 2nd life cap for a good while, she's also my crafter and until I get my monk done I'll probably keep her for raiding/epic'ng/crafting. Is your buddy's build using the x-bows and rune arms or what? I'd like to hear more on that. Probably looking at Solar Pheonix for my Pally PLs for sure otherwise.

[Marnin_Wood]

Half-orc fighter(18)/monk(2) = done. Just run that 3 times and play it like a monk with less of their fun abilities. Though in my opinion going with 3 fighter past lives is silly. The active past life isn't good, and the passive is kinda "meh" as well. If you're having to-hit issues as a monk, then it's a gear problem. Barbarian or paladin past lives are much more useful imo.

I agree on the active fighter PL, but I'm looking for the extra DC's to stunning fist mainly, and the extra to hit is just gravy. Haven't had any problem hitting the boss in epic Big Top consistently while in Earth stance. I do plan on getting 3 each of Barb & Pally PL's as well (if I don't burn out first).