Didn't they try to do this, like, twice already? First with island expeditions, and then Torghast, both of which were very much just chores. Third time's the charm I guess, but I do not have high hopes.
I suppose the key difference here is it's a parallel progression system that gears you up to Heroic raid level, whereas Visions and Torghast were the only way to upgrade your legendary. Solo/duo/trio players get a new way to gear, or it's an option to dip into if a given week's prefixes aren't friendly to their M+ group, for example.