I've tested this deck a little and found it quite nice although you sometimes really have situations in which you only win because your opponent doesn't have stuff and you're applying the pressure. Nothing bad there but a strange feel for a 'control' deck.
I've also found Counterbalance to be not quite as scary as I've imagined it to be. You almost never hit something blindly and only have 4 cantrips (Brainstorm) in comparision to NQGs 8+ to set it up. It's awesome in conjunction with Top, but that's 2 cards and even then with 22 lands and spells you won't really use to counter stuff (cmc3 and cmc4) I've not found it that impressive but maybe that comes from not having tested extensively yet.

Why do people have problems with Standstill? It's still the best draw spell if you're in a semi-good board position and you shouldn't have any problems with starting the game in the late-game so that a competent opponent will always break it as quickly as possible. Decking under this just won't happen and even if, you've still got Academy Ruins to prevent this.
If people are really investigating into some alternative, I once met someone from these boards (sorry, forgott who) on MWS who was playing a Landstill build with Think Twice in the place of Standstill, maybe that'd be an (uncosty) alternative.