MINI-WARS 2025 convention report

Well it took me me a while but after my niece's wedding across the country in New Jersey and arguably the greatest World Series in baseball history (Hey, I may be from Brooklyn but I've lived in Los Angeles for almost 30 years!) I'm back with a Convention Report for HMGS-PSW Mini-Wars 2025...

The convention was held on Saturday October 11th and Sunday October 12th in the Portola Pavilion of the Titan Student Union building on the campus of Cal State University Fullerton.

We had just over 100 attendees enjoying just over 40 events, mostly tabletop miniature wargames and RPGs, with a few boardgames, 2 hobby classes (one on figure painting & one on terrain making), a painting competition and one seminar thrown in for good measure, as well as the annual membership meeting of the Historical Miniature Gaming Society, Pacific Southwest (HMGS-PSW) on Sunday morning.

We also had a few vendors present on both days, selling figures, dice, games, etc., as well as the convention's traditional Flea-Market.

I'm happy to note that this year we gave out awards to GMs for the most outstanding games.  Here's the complete list and congrats to all the winners:

1. BEST OF SHOW: Game #14 THE BATTLE OF FREEMAN’S FARM - Dana Munson
2. BEST SEND IN THE MARINES! THEME GAME: Game #17 TARAWA - St. Crispin’s Wargames Club
3. YOUNG GUARD AWARD: Game #25 ESCAPE FROK THE GOBLIN CAVERNS - Chloe Selby
4. POUR ENCOURAGER LES AUTRES* Game #34 D&D 5E - Mark Dormitori
5. POUR ENCOURAGER LES AUTRES  Game #6 F.O.W. RACE TO BERLIN (TOURNAMENT) - Richard Aldrete
6. POUR ENCOURAGER LES AUTRES  Game #24 BATTLE OF MONOCASY - John Cobello
7. POUR ENCOURAGER LES AUTRES  Game #20 F.O.W. EAST AFRUCA - Michael & Daniel Verity
8. POUR ENCOURAGER LES AUTRES  Game #35 APES VICTORIOUS - Chris Lundgren
9. POUR ENCOURAGER LES AUTRES  Game #26 SHORES OF TRIPOLI - Nick Stern
10. POUR ENCOURAGER LES AUTRES  Game #8 GASLANDS - Frank Perkins

*Pour encourage les autres means "To encourage the others" in French and is the award title used by the original HMGS (sometimes referred to as HMGS-East) that ran the first Historicon back in 1984 and still runs it and the other largest & most highly-regarded wargaming conventions in the USA, generally in Pennsylvania.  The term is meant to signify a game that embodies the best aspects of our hobby and serves as an inspiration to others.

At the Sunday morning membership meeting a lot of enthusiasm was expressed for the previous day's game offerings, which was cool.  Right now all signs point to Mini-Wars 2026 being back at the same venue and probably being held on the same Columbus Day holiday weekend (albeit not stretching into Monday).  When that becomes official I will no doubt return to spread the word, hopefully early enough on the calendar to make it easier for people who'd like to attend to plan ahead and fit it into their schedules.

On Sunday I ran my first ever terrain-making workshop, which was a lot of fun.  I only had 4 participants but I'm happy to report they all seemed to enjoy themselves and of course they each got to take home some pretty sweet rocky terrain pieces, built Mad Guru style, ready for use in future games on tabletops where they will look pretty cool -- at least IMHO!

That's about it -- except for my usual ton of pics from the convention, as seen below...

SATURDAY:

SUNDAY:

One of the Leatherneck Surfer trophies we created for this year's Mini-Wars...

My buddy, Nick Stern and I, just before he climbed into his car to drive five hours North to his place in San Francisco.  He brought his "Shores of Tripoli" game to the con -- which was a big hit and earned one of the "Pour Encourager Les Autres" awards.  Even though his game very much deserved it, the truth is he deserved it even more, since he was the artist who drew the original illustration of the WWII USMC surfer for the convention flyer.  The 2D artwork was then turned into a printable STL file by my buddy Odin Benitez's brother, Thor (their dad was a BIG comic book fan!), and that file was then troubleshot and printed by Mini-Wars Convention Committee member Dave Selby.  The plinths were made by HMGS-PSW Board member Frank Patterson, the 3D models were finished in 2 tone metallic paint by master modeler Mark Deliduka, and the awesome wood mini-plaques were laser-engraved by Mini-Wars Committee Member Brian Knott's sister, Lisa Kessler.

To Nick, Odin, Thor, Dave, Frank, Mark, Brian and Lisa, I repeat my sincere thanks for helping to make the creation of these trophies a reality so we could present them to a bunch of deserving GMs -- Nick included -- though neither he nor I had any idea it would end up that way when he volunteered to draw the Pacific War Jarhead surfer for us!