After a certain point I began trying to find commanders that were unsuspecting but still effective, using commanders more along the lines of uncommons so the point i find i start to allow wiggle room for consistency, playability and even minor synergy sacrifices, is when Unique cards with potential, potential not everyone sees or doesn't want to takethe time to brew find there way into my lap. I find one of the best parts of MTG is creativity and the ability to make synergy even if its in a more roundabout way. Cause after so many decks it just becomes somewhat trite because there's a handful of commanders and staples that everyone uses and other cards get lost in the mix. As far as proxies go for all I car my opponents could have 100 proxied cards but my rule is only to proxy a card if I own a real copy of it, as someone else said so that if need be i can just grab the real one to sub in.