Balance Patch July 2019 -- The Rise of "Tech Splash" and Nod Drones?

Just a couple of days after the last patch we get more balance changes.

If you prefer video, and some additional analysis, I highly recommend 13lade's video on the patch:

Buffs:

• Tech Lab cost reduced depending on the number of other buildings you have. It now costs 150 Tiberium, which is up from 120 Tib. But the cost is reduced by 30 Tib for each other building you already have. Means Barracks into Tech lab, the effective Tech lab cost is identical. But now 4 buildings might be viable, and then the Tech lab would only cost 60 effectively!
• Hammerhead attack speed +6%
• Wolverine vehicle damage +27%, air damage +11% -- might mean that it now beats Pitbulls again?
• Zone Troopers & Cyborgs double attack speed and halve damage to air and vehicles. If this is not a typo, their DPS against air doubles. If it is a typo and air damage is also halved, it's just relevant against GDI drones. Which seems questionable as drones were nerfed independently already.
• Centurion 
• attack speed doubled
• vehicle damage halved -- this means it's better against squad units like Wheels & Dogs
• infantry damage reduced by a third -- this means it's DPS vs infantry is now effectively up 50%, considering the attack speed
• Confessors +12.5% air damage
• Nod Laser Drones +25% attack speed, +15% vehicle damage -- so compound +44% DPS! This is gigantic. Harvester damage was reduced by 6%, but even that is still higher due to the attack speed buff.
• Phantom now has 4 rockets with roughly the same DPS, which is a buff mostly against GDI drones (now also vs Laser Drones, which might become more commonplace)

Nerfs:

• Pitbull is nerfed in a bit of a "hard to understand" way:
• "Charge delay increased from 0.1 to 0.75"-- if this is the delay to the first shot, this seems very significant
• "Attack Lock on Timer" increased from 0 to 0.75" -- this might mean the Pitbull will lose it's acquired target (seen with the red beam quicker if it doesn't stay in range
• Without testing, it seems hard to foresee how much it changes the typical situations, e.g. standard Bíke vs Pitbull fights, or Banshee vs Pitbull fights, or Orca vs Pitbull fights
• Scavengers attack speed -15%, hitpoints -13%

Both nerf and buff:

• Liang drone 
• Duration down from 30 to 26 seconds 
• Hitpoints +30%
• Healing to infantry reduced by 10%

Personal thoughts:

• Tech changes are interesting, and especially Tech units that are used as the single Tech unit (aka "Tech splash") will benefit, i.e. Sandstorm, Artillery, Mammoth, Avatar, maybe Kodiak/Basilisk. Interesting to see whether 4-building decks will be seen a bit more commonly now
• Yet, I do not agree with Captain Benzie that it's great that we'll see more Tech. I do like "Aggro metas", as the units are balanced better against each other than many Tech units are. So if you like micro battles, you like a diverse Aggro meta more than a "Tech Splash" meta
• Scavenger nerf is very justified. Hard to judge whether it's enough, but it seems reasonable.
• Pitbull nerf is hard to foresee just from the theory. Need to test.
• Nod Laser Drones buff seems very hefty, I'm a bit worried it might be a tad too much. Certainly enough that we might now see more Nod air decks!
• Inferno / Phantom already was very strong again after the hitpoint buff for Inferno. One weekness were GDI drones, which are now easier to kill for the Phantom. 
• The direct nerfs to GDI drones from the last patch, and now the indirect ones from this patch (Phantom, Zone Trooper, Cyborg) seem too much

Captain Benzie on the patch: