I just love these changes. Especially with the detailed explanations they give. They all make a lot of sense to me. I played Magic from 1995 to 2005 and I remember HATING the 6th edition changes. Looking back now they were one of the best things ever to happen to the game.
I haven't played in 4 years but I am thinking about getting back in the game. Besides these changes the new Planeswalkers and small things like all core sets being black bordered now really show that Wizards are doing everything to keep the game healthy and fresh.

Any news on this deck? Has anyone else tried it out? Any new ideas on the Stax matchup?

Maybe maindeck Thoughtseize?

How about adding:
4 Elves of Deep Shadow (for Llanowar or Fyndhorn) and Demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor, Imperial Seal and Fastbond for 4 Wirewood Simbiote?

Fastbond seems really good, especially with Quirion Ranger

Have you tested this deck? I have to admit I haven't, but I played a lot of Suicide Black, back in the day when it was an answer to mono blue.

It seems to me your mana-base cannot support your spells. The amount of black producers seems way off. I used at least 15 swamps, but 16 or 17 usually felt better, then come 5 strips which you desparately need for disruption, and your total base is 22 lands.

If you want an excellent primer on the subject of Suicide Black you can read the one by Legend. It is dated by now, but the basic points are still the same and still very valid today.

http://www.themanadrain.com/index.php?topic=11797.msg222583#msg222583

As a quick update:

Since the days of Legend, Discard has changed from being a threat to being an enabler. I believe Hymn to Tourach is no longer playable in Type 1 (Ichorid, Goblin Welder, Y Will etc)

So it should definately be replaced by Thoughtseize.

A second point that is not adressed in the primer (I believe) but which came to me during my testing, back in the day is:

Do I need Dark Ritual?
If you are not going for storm, and you are just running one Yawgmoth's Will, without any tutors...
Do the Dark Rituals actually help you?

I'm not saying they are useless. But I do say that they require significant thought and a deck design that is built around them.

if you are gonna build your deck from the ground up:

Elvish Lyrist
Druid Lyrist
Elvish Scrapper
Scavanger Folk
Viridian Zealot

Seem pretty synergetic.
Maybe add some Equipment for them to use if your opponent has no viable targets?
Or Null Rod if you want to go the other way. Something like this:

4   Druid Lyrist
4   Scavanger Folk
4   Jungle Lion
4   Rancor
4   Null Rod
4   Tarmogoyf
4   Vexing Shusher
3   Cold Eyed Selkie
2   Crucible of Worlds
1   Regrowth
1   Crop Rotation
4   Elvish Spirit Guide
4   Land Grant
5   Stripmine
8   Forest
4   Fetchland

Other synergys should be apparent: Crop Rotation, Stripmine, Crucible. Rancor instead of equipment because of Null Rod. Also works very nice with Cold Eyed Selkie.

I agree, but since this thread is to examine the options, I just thought it might be interesting to examine the idea.  If the thread is to list proven options then please disregard the below:

It was inspired by the deck that Kevin Rogers ran at the British Nationals, which can be found at : http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/16313.html (no premium required)

I wonder if drains could be added to such a deck. Mana Drain would function more as an accelerator than as a pure control tool in such a deck. Like how it was used in Hulk Smash.
With 4 Stifles and 4 Dreadnoughts it could be reasonably simple to assemble the combo. Another option could be to take a more control oriented route with only 1 Dreadnought, combined with control artifacts such as Tormod's Crypt and Engineered Explosives, to be fetched by Trinket Mage.

A final option could be to go the extreme control route (e.g. Steve Menendians BBS 3.0 deck), replacing the Chalices with Stifles and Morphlings with Dreadnoughts:

8 Island
3 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand
4 Wastelands
1 Strip Mine
1 Library of Alexandria

1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Emerald
1 Sol Ring
1 Black Lotus
4 Stifle
4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain
0 Misdirection
4 Mana Leak
4 Impulse
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
4 Thirst for Knowledge/Ophidian
3 Back to Basics/Powder Keg
1 Trickbind
4 Phyrexian Dreadnought

Sideboard:
4 Energy Flux
4 Propaganda
3 BEB
4 Control Magic

This deck would forsake the resiliance of standard mono-blue for a quick win option. The biggest difficulty is of course having to determine when to switch form re-active to pro-active. I don't know whether it would actually work...

How about Stifle + Dreadnaught as a win condition?
Stifles obviously are usefull on their own in a heavy permission deck. You could easily run 4 Dreadnaughts if Thirst for Knowledge is the draw-engine.

Aw c'mon Toad, it's not THAT bad is it?

I think there are two kinds of 'not fun' we shouldn't confuse.

There is 'i lost a game and although the game was intense, losing is never any fun'

and there is 'i didn't even get to play a game and that wasn't any fun'

If you lose because your Akroma got controlled you were outplayed and at least had a chance. If you lose to turn 1 Trinisphere, turn 2 Crucible you never had a chance.

now although this is a bit black/white it does help to clear the issue.

It's a bit of a nitpick but, Bargain makes you skip your draw step which means the damage from Mana Vault will never happen.

On a different note: great list. I play a list quite similar to yours but with 24 mana sources and 2 Slavers. I'll cut one of both to fit in the DA's which I think are a brilliant addition. Who would have thought the deck with the best 2 draw engines in the game would actually benefit from even more draw?

Whatever you do, go for the 4-ofs first
For example 4 manadrains is gonna cost about 200-240
a mox sapphire is gonna be about the same price, but the difference of playing with 4 drains is obviously much greater than playing with 1 mox

So for GaT:
Get the duals and fetchies first
I assume you have intuitions, AKs, wishes, tutors etc.
Get 4 FoW
Get a Berserk

Now you are ready to play budget GaT or Tog (run a Fastbond to compensate for the lack of moxen, and vanilla Counterspells in place of the Drains)

then get
Ancestral Recall
Time Walk

These are all HUGE in GaT/Tog with all the drawing and tutoring you'll play Ancestral and Time Walk EVERY GAME (and sometimes twice because of Will

then get 4 Man Drains

I don't care what some people say about mana-burn, it happens sometimes, but most of the time you'll be able to drain into a tutor and start the Intuition AK engine or you'll be to wish for an answer. Drain is awesome.

Finally get the artifact mana, this will speed up your deck considerably but is least important. I'd go with this order:

Black Lotus
Mox Sapphire
Mox Jet
Mox Emerald
Ruby / Pearl

Hope this helps

Well I don't know about any of the new builds, but I used to play "classic Sui" and it absolutely rocked Control

Now I'm talking about the 4 Shade, 4 Negator, 4 Hippy-Sui of Yesteryear with Sinkholes, 5 Strips and either Null Rod of Powder Keg to ruin mana -bases.

So to answer your question: well, it depends on your meta.
If it really is only Control, Old Skool Sui is the perfect deck (replace Hippies, with Wretches, though)
If there is Aggro, you'll lose. If there's combo you'll have to be really lucky.

I haven't tested your exact build but I have a lot of experience with Tog and GaT in T1

considering your build I would go with:
-1 Vampiric (move to the SB), +1 Wish, faster kills, more SB utility
-1 Regrowth, +1 Intuition, the draw engine is more important, plus its an instant
-1 Fastbond, +1 Intuition, FB is only really good in three scenarios
1) with Gush, 2) with YWill 3) in you opening hand
but in case 1) and 2) the other cards should be game winning anyhow and in case 3) Intuition is almost always better (especially if you are powered)

I never found DA necessary MD but if you insist, you could play 2 over the Misdirections

Hope this helps

PS get a Time Walk already, dammit!

This is an interesting idea, I suppose it was inspired by Smmenen's recent article and the references to "Who's the beatdown?"

Understanding the role of your deck is very important for your game-plan and side-boarding strategy vs. a particular opponent.
There is one  thing missing from you approach though:

There is no longer a "Magic TriForce" there is a new archetype "(Artifact) Prison" so there are now 4 roles to choose from

Now the most interesting questions (for me at least) are: what role should an aggro-control deck choose?

examples for deck building:
should mono-U fish use Unstable Mutation or Curiosity?
should GAT still run Fastbond and Future Sight or would 2 Pernicious Deed be better?

examples for sideboarding:
can GAT board out it's entire draw engine (4 AK, + 1/2 Intuition) against Prison decks to make room for artifact and creature removal?

examples of match-up analysis:
Fish vs. Sui, who's the Beatdown?
TNT vs. mono-B Mask, who's the Beatdown?
GAT vs. EBA, who's the Beatdown?

I like the idea of adding Stifles and going the mana denial route, Now you have 4 Strips, 2 Stifles and 1 Shaman, that seems very strong in a powered meta.

I think Gush is almost always beter than FoF main, so I would switch those.

Also I'm not so sure on the power of Merchant Scroll without an Ancestral to fetch. But I can see how the Intuition/AK engine is very important to this deck.
On that issue i would like to say that when I was still unpowered I ran 4 Ophidians as a draw engine besides 1 Intuition and 4 AK.
If your meta is full of aggro I wouldn't recommend it, but in more controllish meta's this can be a very good idea. I know this is not a conversion you see very often but I had some nice results with, so give it a chance

Finally, 2 F/I seems a bit much, I would switch one of those for a Deed, which would also complement the mana denial theme. A Deed main had save my ass very often and I would never play without one.

Good luck!

Crash is certainly nice, but personally I main-deck 3 [card]Meltdown[/card] (I do not play Ankhs, but Price of Progress and Fireblasts in those slots)

Also, because Artifact Prison is rampant in my meta, I board 3 [card]Pulverize[/card] Thats usually game vs w Mud