UwU Con 2026: Miniatures, Mystery Boxes, and a Weekend in Mesa

We packed up the minis, loaded the booth, and headed to UwU Con 2026 in Mesa, Arizona for a weekend of fantasy miniatures, anime-inspired chaos, mystery boxes, and meeting a whole lot of tabletop players.

Like every convention, we went in with a plan.

And like every convention, we came home with a few new ideas.

One of the best parts of the weekend was getting to meet players from completely different corners of the tabletop community. We talked with high-school students building their first characters, experienced Game Masters looking for new monsters for their campaigns, painters hunting for something interesting to put on the workbench, and longtime players who have been rolling dice since the earliest days of fantasy roleplaying games.

That mix is one of our favorite things about tabletop gaming.

No matter how long you've been playing, eventually everybody ends up standing around a table talking about tiny plastic monsters.

The UwU Con Exclusive Pack Was a Hit

For the convention, we put together a special UwU Con Exclusive Fantasy Miniature Pack featuring anime-inspired fantasy characters created specifically for the weekend.

We thought we had printed plenty.

We were wrong.

The pack was popular enough that after the first day, we realized we were on track to sell through what we brought. So naturally, the printers went back to work and we made more.

That's a pretty good problem to have.

The response also confirmed something we've been experimenting with more lately: tabletop players aren't limited to one particular fantasy aesthetic.

Sometimes you want the armored knight.

Sometimes you want the terrifying monster.

And sometimes your campaign desperately needs an anime-inspired adventurer with entirely too much charisma.

We're happy to provide all three.

Apparently You Really Like Mystery Boxes

UwU Con was also the first convention where we offered fantasy miniature mystery boxes.

We weren't entirely sure how people would react to them.

Turns out, people like mystery boxes.

A lot.

Each box contained an assortment of miniatures, giving players and painters a chance to walk away with a completely unexpected collection of characters and creatures.

They were popular enough that mystery boxes are officially joining the convention lineup going forward.

We did learn one important lesson, though.

Some customers liked them enough to grab more than one, which introduced a problem we hadn't really considered: making sure someone doesn't accidentally buy two boxes containing the same assortment.

For future conventions, we'll be adding a small visual identifier to the packaging so we can quickly make sure repeat buyers are getting different boxes.

That's one of the benefits of taking new ideas directly to conventions.

Sometimes the best product development meeting is simply watching people buy the thing.

Meeting the Tabletop Community

The sales are obviously part of running a convention booth, but some of our favorite moments happen between transactions.

UwU Con gave us the opportunity to meet a ton of tabletop RPG players, miniature painters, collectors, cosplayers, artists, and other small businesses.

We also made some new vendor friends over the weekend, which is always one of the underrated parts of conventions.

When you're spending several days surrounded by artists, makers, and other people crazy enough to turn the things they love into businesses, conversations happen pretty quickly.

Ideas get shared.

Booth strategies get compared.

Everyone checks out everyone else's weird creations.

And occasionally somebody reminds you that you've been standing behind a table for eight hours and should probably eat something.

Bringing Charm & Ember Into the Real World

Most of the year, Charm & Ember exists somewhere between our workshop, our printers, and the internet.

Conventions are different.

They're one of the few opportunities we get to put hundreds of our fantasy tabletop miniatures in front of people at once and actually watch what catches their attention.

Some people head straight toward the dragons.

Some want adventurers.

Some start digging through monsters.

Some discover the mini subscription.

And increasingly, we're meeting players who own their own 3D printers and are interested in our growing collection of digital STL miniatures.

That feedback helps shape what we design next, what we bring to future shows, and how we make the booth better every time.

One of the best parts of the weekend was the people we met along the way. We also want to give a huge shoutout to Gnomish Creations, AZ Stolas, and Amazing Imaginarium — the crew behind “What’s in the Box?”  for being some of the amazing new friends we made at UwU Con. Getting to know other artists, makers, and small businesses is one of the things that makes convention weekends worth it, and we’re really glad our paths crossed.

We'll See You Next Year

UwU Con gave us a chance to try a few new things, meet a lot of great people, and spend a weekend surrounded by the wonderfully chaotic overlap between anime, fantasy, gaming, and tabletop culture.