how much compression is too much?

If you are running race gas, then run what ever compression you like. General rules for pump gas, no more than 10.7:1 with aluminum heads, 9.8:1 with iron heads....opinions will vary, and there are a ton of variables (e.g. if you have a huge cam bleeding off a lot of cylinder pressure you could run more static compression).

My old 410 motor was 10.8:1 on pump gas, worked great. Switched it over to e85, still worked great. With that said, my 410 re-build that I'm starting now will be 13:1 on e85....should run low 10's.
not to steal the thread, but did you have any issues running on e85 at all?