Can't change gear in rated BGs

Title. Is this a bug or intended? I joined a rated BG while doing quests and couldn’t change into my pvp gear in game. This is unacceptable.

It is intended, but you should be able to change gear in the starting room. In the past, players had found specific items that granted a huge advantage in certain situations. So they would gear swap mid game to whatever was necessary. Not a very elegant solution, but it works.

For some reason you can gear swap in Blitz though, which is kind of strange.

Take a sec to hit your equipment set button before you accept the Q.

It’s why I started upgrading my PvP gear instead of using a PvE set to WQ,

I wanted to bump this, because it isn’t consistent.
About an hour ago I did a Blitz where I forgot to swap to my PVP gear. I didn’t notice until half way through, and I just swapped with no issues.

Then I did some world stuff in my PVE gear, decided to do 1 more Blitz for the night, queued up. This time I remembered but as the gates opened. I wasn’t able to swap gear the entire game.

What gives? Why was I able to swap half way through in the first BG but not at all in the second?