When N was first rotated, I jumped for joy. It was nice being able to plan a few turns in advance based on what was in my hand, and N-to-1's sucked a lot. But after a while, I kind of missed the times where I'd get shuffled out of bad hands during the first few turns of the game. N felt like a nice mutual setup card along the lines of HGSS Pichu. Personally, I'd rather lose from a late-game N than an early game dead draw because Judge or Birch left me with scraps to work with. I'll take the bad with the good!
Still... I think now that people have a taste of how not playing those early Ns can actually hurt your opponent, people might start running less of them instead of the full 4, and still use 1 or 2 Judge and/or Birch.
[EDIT] Alas, I still would have preferred to see Oak's New Theory again, or a new card with a one-sided N effect. That could be pretty balanced on its own, letting you draw big during the part of the game you need it most, and small during the part where you're closer to decking out.