Won't call it a death of HD, but I do see a melting of coaches in the short term.
Unlike the shift from GD to GD v2.0 (which was a complete and utter cluster flop) the saving grace here is that the engine for gameplay itself will not be changing. So the games will continue to run as-is, people will just have to get accustomed to the new recruiting mechanisms. And, again unlike GD, there seems to be much more information flowing from the beta world to the masses to alert folks to some of the changes.
That said, rolling out the beta to worlds in an as-is version would be a nightmare and a mistake. As-is, it is a flawed product and I'm not sure it even addresses the issue that was claimed as the rationale for its creation (I will defer to those doing the beta at D1 to voice an opinion on its effect there...). With attention to some of the issues that have been brought up, I can still in my mind see a route to where this will be a different, but not bad product. Human beings are naturally adverse to change, and there will undoubtedly be people who drop the game over this change, but I don't yet see this as a sign that the apocalypse is necessarily upon us.
My biggest concern is WIS' habit of doing things quickly rather than doing them right when it comes to the transition from beta to game worlds. Those who were here when the game engine in HD changed will recall the need to re-tweak that process over the 2-3 seasons because it was moved out of beta before the bugs were fully worked out of the process. This is also the reason why GD will never again receive a dime of my money.