My target start is still 140k although only a small percentage of my successful starts are over 140k. I'd say right now a big majority of my successful starts are in the range of 135k - 140k.
Because I am so aggressive about scoring well on the first 3 screens of the game and I've improved my scoring on 2-2, I always have a very decent chance of exceeding 50k after Level 2 now. This puts me in a position to hit 140k comfortably if things go well, but if things only go about average from there I am generally a bit short.
In general though, I consider "playing at 1.2M pace" to only require starts of about 137,500 so when I come up a bit short of 140k I'm still ok with it.
These are the "Start and Level" benchmarks I've always used:
1M 107,500 + 52,500 / lvl
1.05M 115,000 + 55,000 / lvl
1.1M 122,500 + 57,500 / lvl
1.15M 130,000 + 60,000 / lvl
1.2M 137,500 + 62,500 / lvl
With these benchmarks, any "death points" are just gravy and could serve as a buffer in case some bad luck ruins the pace or fatigue sets in or you just have trouble maintaining pace.
Of course, as you have more trouble hitting these benchmarks, you need to pay more attention to requiring strong deaths to compensate. This has become an important part of my thought process for approaching 1.2M attempts since I don't have the confidence that I can actually average 62,500 / lvl for a whole game. So, whenever possible (especially on barrels), my strategy is to take less risk in the beginning of a screen and take more and more risk towards the end of the screen when I have already banked a "good death" if I end up dying. This is why I allow fireballs to get to the top of a barrel screen so often compared to other players -- because this is the best way to die unintentionally in the game.
The way I currently approach keeping track of my pace in 1.2M games is that I think of the 1.15M benchmarks (which are all extremely easy to remember and/or calculate on the fly) and then realize that I need to "find" an extra 50,000 points somewhere. I try to make up my first 10k on the start and then I look at my 3 extra guys and hope that they are worth roughly 30,000 points. That means, beginning on Level 5, I only need to "make up" an additional 10,000 points to be "on pace". So, if I have a few good levels and can get to where I'm 20,000 over the 1.15M benchmarks with no deaths I'll then consider myself "on pace". Of course, each time I die, this all changes. After one death, I'll consider that I need to be 20,000 over the 1.15M benchmarks just to keep up with my starting point and I still need to "make up" another 10,000 points from there -- and so on.
So, let's say I have a below average start of 132,000 points. I'll already feel like I'm "behind" and I now need to make up 18,000 points beyond 60k / lvl, which is quite a bit more than the 10,000 that I'm comfortable trying to make up after a 140k start. In this example, if I were to get 60,000 on Level 5 and then I get hit by a spring on Level 6 I'll probably be aborting the game right there since the amount of points I'll need to "make up" has become unrealistic. On the other hand, if I score 52,000 points after Level 2 and then I have a 13,000 point death on 3-1, I'll continue that game and be pretty excited about it.
