I fully admit I'm super-casual but at this point the WoW systems team (specifically the systems team, not the class or raid teams) are just bad designers. Artifact Power punishes you for having alts, punishes you for wanting to play multiple specs, punishes you for taking a week off the game, and punishes you for wanting to tool around and not fill arbitrary bars.
AK is just a band-aid over a festering wound. If the system had been well designed there would be no need for a catch-up mechanic.
The core of the problem is how Blizzard have treated this nebulous thing known as player progression for two expansions now. For close to ten years, although it varied there was a very straight-forward way to "win" the game. Level up. Hit endgame. Get better gear. Boom. Simple. You can vary the gear sources, you can tweak how abilities are gained through leveling, whatever you want. But the bullseye is right in front of you. It's not an endless treadmill.
By comparison Blizzard have spent the last three years throwing everything from Garrisons to Shipyards to Artifacts to Class Halls at us that require you to grind punishing and un-fun amounts of Arbitrary Magic Fun Points to upgrade a... thing.... with a finite lifespan. They try and make "progression" more "compelling" but I'd argue that they really fundamentally fail. Something you "have to do" isn't something you necessarily want to do.
There's serious problems I have with the ways Blizzard looks to engage players. AP could have been a static number of points you share between specs. Blizzard could have added a passive buff to alts to let you get significantly boosted AP up to the point of your highest character for the week. Blizzard could have chosen to let you experience a whole class hall campaign without arbitrary time gates, micro-management or garrison missions. Legendaries, Titanforging... ugh.
I would argue that there is very little compelling, engaging or fun justification behind a lot of the systems team's contribution to WoW over the last three to four years. Sure, you want to keep players subscribed longer, but I'd say the way they've gone about it is very short-term thinking. It's beyond burnout. It's a lingering disgust at pointless complexity and timesinks.