DELAY! BioWare Struggling to FIX Anthem

"Biowar's fucked if Anthem fails." Well d'uh. 
Any company that gets into bed with EA is hanging the sword of Damocles over its own head. EA absorbs companies based on the success of a franchise, forces in transparent money-grinding mechanics to milk as much as they can out of that franchise's fanbase, then blames and shuts down the studio when the franchise inevitably fails.
This is why people don't like EA. This is why people don't trust EA. This why a Destiny clone (which, by its very nature, is already starting off on the back foot) has to be far more than simply 'good' to encourage people to buy it.
It wouldn't surprise me if the delay had nothing to do with development: given the current state  of things, the mere mention of loot boxes and microtransactions of any kind could sink all hopes, but this being EA, they'd rather wait for the heat to die down than remove any of that from the game. That would undermine their sole reason for having it made in the first place.

Why does this feel like EA is holding Dragon Age 4 as a hostage?

If the game needs to be delayed to be good, go for it.

I just wish that when EA meddles and causes a game to do poorly, the meddler at EA gets punished instead of the poor studio.

I hope Anthem fails and EA puts Bioware down they aren't the same company anymore and just have the name in common at this point

Gamers need to learn (and they have had plenty of lessons to teach them so far) that any studio owned by EA is going to become a dumpster fire.

Publishers need to learn that giving themselves over to EA is signing their own death warrant... and the greed of the people making the money out of these deals should be obvious (especially as they are some of the first to leave).