Looking for 360 advice on a budget.

The magnum is good for roughly .5 of compression,so if you currently have 8:1 it will come up to 8.5:1.Use a thinner set of head gaskets (gotta buy em anyway!) and it will be close to 9:1,maybe a bit higher.

The truck will have everything you need for the swap minus the pushrods and lifters. You will need the complete heads with rocker gear and head bolts as magnum head bolts are different from la head bolts. The lifters will come with whatever cam you choose,so you only need pushrods.Call it $100. Also a magnum intake or drill the heads for la intake.Get new valve springs.Use the GM beehive 3100 spring.It's the cheapest one and the mopar spring costs a lot more. There is also a guy here selling magnum springs.

I would use the mags and balance the engine.