Maybe the solution is to unban other tempting Bribery targets? The recurring theme of Commander seems to be that green gets a card that all the blue players want to steal, and the green card gets banned so they can't. Ban bribery so that once PoK is banned, we don't have threads on how all the metas have warped into three blue players racing to bribery the green player's Courser of Kruphix or something.
It's certainly has enough green in its casting cost to warrant further scrutiny from the rules committee, but hopefully that blue saves it from the fate of its titan and primordial cousins.
My take on proxies typically goes something like this:
Friend: Commander?
Me: My deck's incomplete.
Friend: You took your deck apart again?
Me: Yeah - found a good card for it on TCG.
Friend: Just proxy it.
Me: I hate proxies.
The most expensive card I own is either Damnation or Karn Liberated. Not sure which is more. My deck's current value TCG Middles for about 500, but at one point it was 700. I've probably invested 1k into it over time, with lots of mistakes and remakes.
If you throw in a Contamination and Bitterblossom, your opponents can marvel for the rest of the game at their intact, beautiful mana bases -- untapped -- forever. The best opponents are the ones who aren't playing. Nobody loses to goldfish.
Conversely, the loser is allowed to be mindful for the table and fold without setting back the remaining players, but that's not the table's decision to make. The table that takes one player out long before the rest deserves no consideration from that player regarding "fun for the group". In a situation where the whole table was mindful to try and keep everyone playing as best as possible, then that table is worthy of reciprocal consideration.
I've enjoyed supplementing my monoblack stax strategy with discard effects like Sadistic Hypnotist and Words of Waste. I see you also play Sadistic Sacrament. I was going to recommend you play similar cards. One of my fondest EDH memories is my opponent saying, "If I can just draw into my answer" to my secured Contamination lock, to which I cast Sadistic Sacrament and assured him he had no answers. But yeah, definitely look into repeatable discard. It's been great for me. Nobody's pointed out the elephant in the room, being Braids in your deck, so I'll assume everyone knows you know it's technically banned (or she'd be my commander). Great card- shouldn't be banned.
He also pairs nicely with Necropotence, albeit not as nicely as if Necropotence didn't have the inconvenient "end of turn" clause. I wish I had a creature-heavy meta. Thraximundar and Sen Triplets are my arch-rivals, and together, we've driven run of the mill battle-cruiser fun decks out of the shop. "I'm building my first dick deck," is sort of a rite of passage here, as new faces show up for commander.
Everybody packs ample creature removal in my EDH experience, so any effect you can get in enchantment form rather than on legs is worth switching over to. My EDH deck is also mono black, and it's effectively 3-drop-enchantment.dec. For being the color least prepared to remove enchantments, black is one of the best for laying them down.
Playing to win puts real ego on the line. You're saying, "win or lose, there are no excuses". Playing for fun gives you an out. You could still be a winner if you wanted to, after all. I know a few people who would rather be potential winners than actual losers.
Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder does a great job of incorporating his story into his mechanics, is in the best colors for tutors, and creates sac-fodder in the color best suited to abuse it. He also slips under most radars, if the rest of the table is playing known heavy-weights.
Friend: Commander?
Me: My deck's incomplete.
Friend: You took your deck apart again?
Me: Yeah - found a good card for it on TCG.
Friend: Just proxy it.
Me: I hate proxies.
The most expensive card I own is either Damnation or Karn Liberated. Not sure which is more. My deck's current value TCG Middles for about 500, but at one point it was 700. I've probably invested 1k into it over time, with lots of mistakes and remakes.
EDIT 05/18/15:
Today, I took out
- swamp
- snow-covered swamp
- blood funnel
and I added- shriekmaw
- aether snap
- vampire hexmage
.I might be replacing abyssal gatekeeper with hero's downfall.