I'm doing just fine on my first life monkcher.

Bows are fucking easy to get with their demand being so low, and you can get your bases covered cheaply with commendaion / cannith challenge gear easily enough.

Really, just learn when to put the bow away and you'll be golden.

don't pick rogue, artificer still gets traps / locks / umd, and it means you don't have to take mental toughness.

Rogue offers virtually nothing, since you'll have conflicting sneak attacks and have umd for heal scrolls anyway.

In my experience with it (to be fair, I didn't play her much on ee other than the high road), the build can get relevant reflex saves without paladin dilettante without much trouble.

It felt too schizophrenic for me. You can't be great at melee or spell casting. You can be ok with either or mediocre at both. Some of the spells are a lot of fun, but others not so much.

I tried to melee, and it just sucked. I was probably doing it wrong but I couldn't be bothered to try harder. My first impression was that it was awful. All the special animal attacks are counted as spells and require spell points. You also can't do them while you're fighting beholders. And each form has different spell attacks so you'll have to focus.

When in animal form you shift to people form and back anytime you open a door, use a lever, open a chest, click a rune... the flashing back and forth gets annoying.