I've found the 1-1 battle to be a losing proposition. Hurkyll''s is good for a sweep if you can really capitalize on the clean board (like a P.O. turn). But even after hurkyll's, you are still countering 1 card at the cost of 2 most times (FoW), and they just have more threats/prison than you have counters. The same goes for swords or disenchant, they have more threatening spells than you can 1-1 remove, but it's even worse now because of ballista/ravager - they will get a +1/+1 or ping for a bunch of damage in exchange for your removal spell.
I have found only a couple tactics to be useful:
Permanent sweepers: Seeds of innocence, by force, shatterstorm, serenity. These are all clean sweeps that negate ravager's dodge ability. They can ravager onto ballista for damage or load up a hangarback, but if they don't have ravager AND one of those outlets, they get swept with no benefit of ravager. Serenity is the fastest mana-wise, but in reality the slowest as you often want the effect the turn you draw it, not the turn after. Serenity also has the drawback of killing your enchantments...which is the next point of attack.
Tax effects: Energy Flux, Tabernacle, Ghostly Prison. E-flux is standard goodness, but they can sometimes pay the mana and swing. Tabernacle is even easier to pay for and swing and they don't need to pay to keep lock pieces on board. Ghostly prison has been my own tech lately as they have to choose between hitting me with their 2/2 balista, 2/1 revoker, 2/2 factory, etc. and can often never swing with more than 1. It doesn't stop them outright and it won't stop ravager/ballista shenanigans, but it does buy time. If you want more time, then you need option 3...
Prison the prison: Stony Silence, Null Rod, Moat. This has been my favorite line as of late. Stony silence and null rod are wrecking balls to the greater field at large, but shops has become VERY reliant on activated artifact abilities lately. Besides hitting their ramp mana, you shut off ravager, overseer, ballista, hangarback, triskelion. You are now left facing a horde of 2/2, 3/3, 2/1, 3/2 ground pounders with the one-of 5/3 (sans metamorph making even more copies). If you can land a moat afterward, it's GG as they have no way to swing or shoot you. Granted, that's a tall order with you shutting off your own ramp and it costing 4 or more through spheres, but if you land moat first - say off of a sol ring or lotus - and THEN stony silence, they just crap bricks. If you can turn 1 stony before they get to play, I'd still do that. You'll slow their explosiveness considerably (especially if they didn't keep a workshop hand) and will get enough time to hit 4 mana.
There is another option, but it's really more effective vs the smokestack variants of MUD...
Resource protection: Sacred Ground, Crucible of the worlds, Karmic Justice, Terra Eternal. By far, Sacred ground is my favorite here. You don't have to replay dead lands for your land drop like you do with crucible (especially if they get crucible too). You never lose land at all with sacred ground. It nerfs crucible and straight out shuts down smokestack. KJ is sweet as you get to pick off one of their permanents every time they shoot off your creature with ballista, wasteland a land, etc., but you still do lose your resource in exchange for theirs. It's the least effective and the most expensive, but it is something. Terra Eternal is better than sacred ground vs wastelands, but only marginally unless they have grave hate. It is more expensive and does squat vs smokestack. SG reigns supreme here for just 2 mana.
In ALL of these cases you'll still want 1-for-1 removal to take out the truly crippling spells that stop you from playing these other cards (crucible if they have waste, trinisphere, lodestone, revoker naming your jewelry). I find fragmentize to be the best value as it is the cheapest under spheres, hits everything in shop's deck, and doubles to kill oath so you are maximizing sb slot efficiency. Disenchant is a close runner up due to instant speed, but it costs 1 more, which means it may actually never get cast.
Notice almost all of my favorite options (bold-faced) are white. To me, it's the superior color vs anything for answer cards. It's not great as a kill outside of mentor, but it's the best answer color.