6MMRPC: MISSION ACCOMPLISHED

The 6 Month Mountain Reduction & Painting Challenge started in September. It's been a fun 6 months. Between a blog roll (here), and a facebook group, we small group of challengees kept in fairly regular contact and were able to share stories of success/failure, and words of encouragement.


The challenge (roughly) involved not buying anything for 6 months (baring 2 'jokers' as cheats), and posting weekly updates. It was not unusual for people to drop off the face of the planet from time to time, sometimes resurfacing........life happens, right? It's interesting to read the summaries of the group now, as it was hard to keep track.

My own summary follows *The below was copied directly from Dave Brawley’s great blog “Towerof the Archmage” and my own answers thereafter.*

The rules, beginning September 1st, are as follows:

1. No purchasing of new miniatures, EXCEPT if you use a joker card. Like in a deck of cards, you get two jokers to use on a figure purchase during the six months of the challenge. Could be a blister pack, an ebay bundle, or a single figure...you can't splurge.

Probable success. I had ordered my perry napleonics at the end of august, so they arrived during the challenge. Pretty clear that is acceptable. I also ordered a group of legio heroica musselmen/muslims for SAGA. We're talking about 40 men (in 15mm)....which is about the same number as buying a box of certain plastics, or a bag of old glory figs. They were ordered in groups of 8, so I may have violated the 'splurge' rule. I can count 2 jokers towards it though.

There were some highly tempting parts of the year (pre-Christmas sales were rife), so this was a hard one.

2. Gifts do not count against you. Christmas and or birthdays etc. Also, if you're given gift cards by your hobby illiterate family or friends, you can without penalty use them on anything you want miniatures wise. 

SUCCESS! In an astounding development I picked up some gift minis. My first set was some pillaging of a box of minis our friend Ryan offered us prior to his move. I grabbed some mordheim figs, some necromunda standins, some chainmail dwarves and orcs, and some foundry stuff. Christmas yielded some more perry plastic. My latest gift was 2 FOW stugs. This is really an astounding amount in 6 months, I hesitate to name when I've managed to get other gifts before.

3. Paints, terrain (or materials), and other hobby supplies do not apply to the no purchasing rule.

SUCCESS! I'm surprised I didn't spend more on this stuff, but I did pick up at least a half dozen new paint bottles.

4. At least one hobby related blog post and/or Instagram update a week. If you Instagram, be sure to hashtag your pic with #6MMRPC 

Success. I can't give it exclamation points. Numbers wise I did it every week for sure. I think my hesitation to claim full success is I blew through my sunday deadline a few weeks, and mosted mid week. Generally I got in a post every week, and sometimes 2 per. Pretty solid output. I think the most surprising thing to me is that I often had real work to present.

5. Zombtober will be part of the 6 month challenge so, Zombie related stuff during October is ENCOURAGED!

SUCCESS! I painted up all my rebel mini zombies, which have sat around far too long. 51 miniatures plus 12 hazmat troopers and 6 survivors.
 

So what was my final mini count for the 6MMRPC? 

6 pieces of terrain, 62 napoleonics (+1 cannon),  4 reaper bones, 95x15mm figs. Plus a heap of partial progress on various items. 

I bought about 50figs (15mm), plus gained a 1-2 dozen 28mm guys. I'm ahead, which is great, but more importantly I've sustained relatively steady work. Usually I do bursts of activity and then lose interest for months. If I can keep up the new habits this is the most valuable work I've manage. I'm also stoked to have made more connections with fellow hobbyists online.

Will I sign on to a second challenge if it’s announced?

Assuredly. There is talk about it starting in late summer. Hopefully we will get more people joining up to add to the fun and community.