FWIW, at my altitude and using the Ebrock recommendations, I dropped all four jets and the rods down 2 stages in cruise and 2 stages in power. It was still running a bit rich at idle, so I stepped it down another set of rods and it was much improved. However, since I had raced Carters for years, I had a plethora of turning parts available to me so swapping was as easy as going to the shelf. If you have to order and wait, then it makes tuning a pain.
I also changed the step down springs to be better match to when the cruise vacuum would release them for power improvements and stepped up the squirter orifice for a better shot of gas when the hammer came down. I also spent some time dialing in the ignition system advance curve.
Net result of all this work on my last vehicle netted a dyno verified 300 horsepower and high teens for average fuel mileage. That may not sound too impressive, but I didn't think it was too shabby for a 440 lugging around a 5000# worth of 1 ton truck at 6000' worth of altitude.
So, IMO, you can make efforts to dial in everything much better. Cam overlap does mean you may have some idle compromise, but you need to tweak it to find out where that level of compromise occurs. That means you can spend weeks changing, driving, adjusting, and verifying that you have achieved the best possible combo, or you can drop a few hundred bucks to put it on a machine to spin it up and sniff the exhaust to get the exact reading of where you are at and where your mods take to.
