As it turns out, the full change notes makes a small mention to something that is currently game breaking for me:
"Overhauled all kinds of research and it's requirements, costs, levels, and such..."

I thought i was going crazy because i had reinstalled kenshi prior to this update and was able to get mounted crossbows and such and then the collection had an update including this that was in said collection, next thing i know i needed cooking to get to level 2 tech and wasnt getting any mounted crossbow tech option. after a couple complete reinstalls of the game i decided to try and narrow down where it was coming from and found your post.

Wait so what is the solution. Cause I'm stuck there too. Can't go further than research bench level 4

Would love to hear more about this, can't robotics, electrical crafting or tech level 4

thank god im not the only one with this issue, im doing a skeleton-only run and I cant get past tech 4, cant even research beds or repair beds because I simply cannot find it anywhere, im so confused

ok so yall, i got the skeleton repair beds, however, you have to research beds first and i have no idea what i researched to get the option to research beds, seems like the prereqs are way too much, and a research tree that you could actually look at would make it not a headache.

I am hopeful that there will be a more complete list, or a Mod that rolls the research changes back. I am pretty close to trying to find the last version of UWE on Nexus and just ignoring this one.

I like the color-coded blueprints and I am sure there are other QOL changes that I haven't noticed yet, but research is a pretty core mechanic and it was already hard to find all the basic research materials; adding to that slog is a just a time suck and takes away from the way I want to play, which is using research as a means to an end, and not the end itself.

Thanks for the feedback. This will be addressed in a "hotfix" update, along with other things that get pointed out by users, in the coming weeks.

Also, for now, you only need to purchase "Advanced Outpost Blueprints", from a Mechanical/Engineering Shop.