Quote Originally Posted by jseah View Post
The minor technical advantages are just that. An actual improvement to the Tau technological base, not an artificially limited gift from the sky. There's nothing to reverse engineer.

Besides, the Tau are still limited by their small size, any expansion will be small and will take some time. Ultimately, without the hyperspace drive, the Tau have no way to seriously destabilize the Imperium, while giving them valuable experience in dealing with Chaos.
Are you planning on speeding up the pace of the story, then? It'll be years, more likely decades, before the Tau expansion would have any noticeable effect on themselves or the Imperium. At the rate Culture plans are proceeding elsewhere, it'd leave the Tau in the dust.