tighter meant better" is the trap in like half of life honestly. You see it with guitar strings, garden soil, even packing a car, more force feels safer but it just wears stuff out faster. That hymnal is proof that a little give is the whole point.

Two heads max for me, three gets sloppy.

Man, that hurts just reading it. Had almost the same thing happen with my 440 build a few years back, ran great for two days then started pushing coolant into number 4, and yep it was my fault for not retorquing the heads after the first heat cycle. In my experience reman heads can be fine but they need the deck checked before you bolt them on, and a lot of guys skip that step because they trust the machine shop. Your mileage may vary, but I'd get the deck and the head surface checked with a straightedge while you have it apart, because if the surface is off even a little it will eat another gasket no matter how careful you are with the torque. Take this with a grain of salt since I'm just some guy in a garage, but you are not alone on this one at all.