I don't think all of Blizzard's design decisions are all bad. I just think they knew with BFA/Allied Races people were going to burn out of 8.0/8.1 content relatively quickly and doubled down on timegating as an effort to keep people subbed for a "reward" instead of cancelling. I don't think it worked.
You would think it would be common sense that such an artificially grindy "sub prolongation" strategy would actually burn most people out, but I guess not. Legion's AP grind alone burned me out hard, and I'm someone who'd scarcely unsubbed from TBC to WoD (except Cataclysm).
I used to log in every day because I actually enjoyed playing the game, but now class design is so shallow that playing it isn't rewarding. So instead of designing something that people log in to for fun, they devise these manipulative strategies to make people feel like they need to do their chores every day, or play infinite RNG slots for that 0.1% chance at a piece of forged gear with the right stats. (Remember when player convenience was prioritized with reforging? Hahaha, oh MoP, you so silly.)