I try to keep a "two amps max," per-song type scenario, and I try to use the scene controllers where necessary to get different gain levels. Of course, that's for live only, not the studio. It's no holds barred, in the studio. Sometimes I throw in a drive to get a bit more "more" when I need it. Whether that means a mid scoop, or boost, or a bit of extra hair, depends on the song. We've recently gone to automated patch changes with a click track (I sing lead, and play guitar, but I was also triggering backing tracks, and changing patches for both bass, and guitar, and it was just getting to be way too much for me to maintain a seamless show.)
My patch programming hangup is that we only have one Axe-FX for bass, and guitar, at the moment. I find ways to get around it, but there are few things I'd really like to be using now, but there's not just enough room in some of our patches. It's not stuff that detrimental to the overall tone. For instance, I'd like to have two amps, and cabs in some patches, just so there's not that tiny dropout between some amp changes. Other than that, I've used tube amps, and analog gear for most of my 22 years as a guitarist, so I usually know how to get the tones I want pretty quickly. I don't really try to mimic any particular gear either, but that's BECAUSE of my experience with the original gear modeled in the Axe-FX. I always found the "real" gear to be too limiting for my style. I tend to prefer a more "post production recorded" feel, which I can easily get out of the Axe-FX.