It's because they're at their lowest subscriber counts since, like...2008, I believe. Phew. 2005, actually.
Exactly. I've been bored of WoD for a while now and I only have 2 garrison toons. They are such a huge time sink. I spend a large chunk of my play time on chores. At the moment garrison things, farming felblight, and the occasional raid with my guild is all I'm doing. We've paid the past few months with tokens from the gold we're getting from missions and selling mats. Maybe I'll be more interested once they finally let us fly and it's not such an epic pain to get around Tanaan. I don't know. I didn't play before my husband picked it up again for WoD and he hadn't played since Cataclysm if I'm recalling correctly, but if Mists/Timeless Isles was as much like WoD/Tanaan as everyone's saying, then I can see why they are losing people. Hopefully Legion is going to make the "garrison" bit a little less onerous.
It's not that I don't like chore based games. Fuck I have Animal Crossing and played that for ages. But Tanaan is about farming balefuls and felblight, and grinding rares. Seriously fuck walking all over and not finding any rares up. Give me flying already, Blizz. But since I don't mind chores, I'm just grinding gold at the moment so I/we have lots for the next xpac.