The Faces of EVE University interview series brings you insight into some of the personalities that make up our staff – a group of dedicated Unistas who tirelessly work for the advancement of learning.

Hippla Tsero:
Q: Hello James Finnan. You returned to EVE Uni a few months back and have taken on quite an important role in the Uni – Director of Logistics. Tell us a bit about your EVE past and why you decided to come back to the Uni?

James Finnan:
I joined the Uni for the first time back when I first started the game. I was boggled by the size of the game and I found myself on the Uni wiki more often than not. So the next logical step was to just join the ingame corporation. In 2015 I left the Uni to join Sabre A with his attempt at restarting Mercenary Coalition (MC).

I struggled with the PvP side of things, as I wasn’t very good at solo or small gang, so I fell backwards into logistics and with the help of my friends CJ and Panda we created the logistics wing of the alliance.

I joined Black Frog with an Alt character to have a steady ISK income and spent my game time moving the entire Alliance across the map several times a month.
Stuff and things and World War Bee happened, I burnt out and went into retirement renting a system in the drone regions with CJ and earning ISK.

In early 2018 I finally left the alliance and game and won EVE. 

Fast forward to 2020 and the pandemic – I got a message from Panda saying that they were all hanging out and mining in Korsiki and wanted me to come along and chill. One thing led to another and we all resubbed and decided to go back to the Uni where the majority of us got our start in EVE. I came back because the Uni has given me so much understanding of this game and most importantly, friends like Panda, CJ and Jubae that have stayed with me since 2015. I wanted to give back and to help where I could.

I do distinctly remember saying “this time round I am not taking on any responsibility in this game”. Obviously I failed.

Hippla Tsero:
Q: I would not call it a failure, but yes, you are now Director of Logistics for the Uni 😉
What exactly do you and your Directorate do on a day-to-day basis?

James Finnan:
My Directorate currently consists of three Departments – Hauling, Production and Reimbursements.

Hauling does exactly what it says on the tin, they move Unistas’ assets to and from trade-hubs and campuses with great speed and also work very closely with production to deliver their goods

Production furnishes our FC team with their defence doctrines, supply ships to FCs in their chosen staging station and support the campuses with contract ships and fuel. 

Reimbursement handles the Ship Replacement Program and the +3 implants program that help all Unistas to get started and to engage in PvP without worrying about the ISK too much.

I have a fantastic team and the managers are second to none at the jobs they have. They work fantastically together and they put anything I have ever done to shame.

Hippla Tsero:
Q: What are some of the major changes you have introduced to the Directorate and why?

James Finnan:
I reorganised the Hauling Department to operate on a system that closely resembles Black Frog and the system we set up in MC. This made everything safer and faster for both pilots and the users.

Other changes would not be fair to attribute to me. I asked that SRP be expanded upon and Pink has done fantastic work there. I asked that campuses use Production more for support and Ariea and his team have knocked it out of the park.

There is something else in the works behind the scene that will be a major change on how we operate logistics. But from the average Unista’s perspective this will go pretty much unnoticed.

Hippla Tsero:
Q: That’s the beauty of Logistics, isn’t it? It is the backbone of the daily operations of the Uni but if things go smoothly, the effort is pretty much invisible. Given this fact, how do you motivate people to join one of your departments (Production, Hauling or Reimbursement)?

James Finnan:
A lot of people find what we do boring or tiresome, and if I am being completely honest, I do too sometimes. But there is a large amount of satisfaction to be had from being the behind-the-scenes support. 

When there has been a large fleet fight and everyone is praising the work done, our FCs are often the first to say that none of it would have happened if the logistics was not there to back it up. 

We may not get shiny killmails and have blingy ships. But a lot of times, we are the reason Unistas were in a place to get those killmails and we delivered that blingy ship. 

So far that and an interest in that particular facet of Eve have been enough of a recruitment tool. 

Hippla Tsero:
Q: Looking into the future – EVE is slowly entering its third decade of existence and the player basis is still going strong. What major changes to EVE would you like to see for the game to continue thriving?

James Finnan:
More regions! They’ve been teased since the prophecy trailer, an honestly amazing trailer! If you haven’t seen it yet, check it out. And I simply want more space to go die in. 

I’d also like some more PvE content similar to the sleeper caches. I saved for my first Rhea running those sites and always had a lot of fun. At least when I wasn’t losing 3 Proteuses a day right in front of the whole Null-Sec Campus.

Hippla Tsero:
Thank you so much JimJams for taking the time to do the interview with us and for all the work that you and your department do behind the scenes. It is much appreciated 🙂