No way. What if the protoform woke up and didn't want to be on an exploration vessel? They're stuck on it for 5 years. No way. They are volunteer positions.

And you're overlooking the role of the Stasis Pod itself.

With a little bit of imagination: The Stasis Pod is dropped off at a planet, the Axalon would fly off to another planet, the pod would land, scan the environment, adapt a Beast mode most suitable for the terrain, and then the reformatted protoform in its new skin would search the new environment to see if it was suitable for colonisation. Then, after a period of time, the Maximal would climb back into the pod and fly back into orbit to meet the Axalon and move on to another planet.

The volunteer Maximal crew would have skills suitable for this job. And a life before getting onboard the Axalon.