Playing london which is very solid and you lost a piece in 12 moves lol... 1600 3min blitz players here are still pretty bad in both time management and simple tactics. At fide arena server i'm playing 3 min some players with real otb blitz/classic fide rating of 1800-2000 and they are pretty damn hard but still we manage to lose a piece somewhere midle/endgame if it is very complicated. GM Hansen which is fantastic bullet/blitz player is also losing pieces to forks etc/tactics when playing vs Hikaru. So yea almost at any level tactics is huge factor.
You have played more than 12 500+ blitz games (with possible more at other sites) and only now breaking 1600? With that much game experience you should be stronger, but a lot of people are like that...
I'm 1600 blitz now, and weirdly enough, MORE of my 3 min games are being decided by 'easy' tactics than ever before. And it's not just because I'm not missing them anymore - computer analysis confirms the blunderfests on each side!
Granted, these are 3-min games, so blunders are def gonna happen. But there are some real doozies still going on at 1600, where I am.
Check this gem of a game out where I make a few errors in the opening, he makes one back (all tactics), and then I win his Q, and chase his Q all the way into my qside for the near-inevitable mate.
And then I hang my Q. Put it RIGHT in the capture square of his N, zero compensation. Doh.
And even more funnily/sadly, he had plenty of time on his clock (at least 50sec), thought for a good 25 sec - and then resigned before capturing my Q!
So 1600-blitz games are unfortunately still ridiculous blunderfests at times. I will add however, that we do have our share of remarkably accurate play, with <12 centipawn loss in like a 45+ move game for either side at 3 min.