This is great *if* you are 100% all voyages. Anything less than 100% it's not so great; if you happen to succeed its all good but if you fail due to less than 100% then the extra percent from a normal crew man could've made the difference between no pay out and pay out. That's a kinda silly way to look at it. Let's say you do voyages that give 100 resources. With +20% resource bonus, that's 120. But if that reduced you to, say 90% success, you're still getting 108 on average. At 80% you're at 96 average. So at over 80%, it's a better idea to bring a +20% resource guy than to elect for a 100% chance without him. However, when you fail, it might not simply reduce the resources gained to zero. Crew members could die, ship might need repairs, or on a lighter note, you might actually recover a chunk of the resources from the mission reward. Depending on how often these occur, it could really affect the calculations. Remember, hindsight is 20/20. If you somehow fail a 99% voyage with a merchant-type, who could've been replaced with someone to get 100% success, don't blame him. It's all about the averages.