they might be afraid of looking too much like wow now that its on a death spiral
I get the sense that they are more afraid of doing anything that makes the game more complex. The BioWare name and KOTOR lineage have brought a significant number of single player RPG types into their first MMO, and BioWare is scared that they will run away if they have to start configuring things or are asked/expected to have certain functionality to participate in group content.
IMO that mindset also explains the lack of any combat log/DPS meter functionality: no complicated numbers to look at, and nobody can be mean to you for being bad. It's really fun to run up against an enrage timer in a hard mode and have no idea if one of your DPS was asleep at the wheel for the entire fight.