Jeff Martin

“Simply put, True Dungeon is the coolest event in the gaming universe. It’s the largest event at Gen Con, in fact it’s so big that Gen Con has to open registration for it separate from the rest of the event listing or the system crashes. It’s so cool it has its own line of merchandise that is traded on the secondary market like collectibles. It must be seen to be believed! I am very proud to have True Dungeon as the Gen Con centerpiece.”

Martin was the president of Dwarven Forge LLC since 2004 until 2014, a company that specializes in hand painted miniature terrain. He has been the lead developer, or co-developer on several Dwarven Forge miniature terrain sets. He has guided two successful Kickstarter projects for Dwarven Forge.

Martin was one of five nominees for the 2004 Diana Jones Award for Excellence in Gaming, an annual award created to publicly acknowledge excellence in gaming. Martin has also received praise in numerous publications for his work with True Dungeon, including Dragon Magazine, and Knights of the Dinner Table.

Martin is the creator of True Dungeon, a life size 3d dungeon puzzle that occurs annually at Gen Con Indianapolis. Not only does he author every adventure to date, but he also builds most of the props and sets used for the event. True Dungeon started at Gen Con Indy in 2003, and has grown wildly since then. True Dungeon has held the record as the biggest event at Gen Con since 2005, selling over 4000 tickets a year for the annual event. In addition to the fantasy styled True Dungeon, Martin worked with Upper Deck Entertainment in 2004 and 2005 to produce True Heroes, an event similar in scale to True Dungeon, but with a superhero theme.

Martin is also the creator and designer of the unique True Dungeon game component known as True Dungeon Treasure Tokens. These have been printed in yearly editions since 2003, and have created their own secondary market on eBay; One token went for over $1,000 at auction. Martin is the lead content designer and co-graphic designer for these full color in-game pieces. Every edition since 2004 has sold out.

Martin started working in the Dwarven Forge booth at Gen Con as a volunteer in 2000, when he noticed Dwarven Forge creator Stefan Pokorny scrambling with others to get the booth open in time. He ended up giving up the rest of his time during Gen Con to help, due to the big response created by the release of D&D 3.0. Over the next few years, Martin managed the Dwarven Forge booths at Origins and Gen Con Indy. Eventually, in 2004, Pokorny asked Martin to manage the company while Pokorny stepped back from the day-to-day operations. Since then, Martin has changed the Dwarven Forge business model from a classic “sold in store” approach, to a “direct to gamers” distribution via their website and game conventions. Martin has developed many sets inside his tenure at Dwarven Forge, and he is especially proud of the Den of Evil and Realm of the Ancient limited-edition product lines.

Martin has been attending the Gen Con gaming convention for over 30 years, and has been a part of the gaming community for just as long. Martin won the first ever RPGA D&D Masters Tournament at Gen Con 20, in 1985. He was also part of a small team of designers involved in the play testing of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons second edition.

Martin started playing Dungeons and Dragons in 1978 when he happened upon a rulebook at a neighbor’s house. He has been playing D&D pretty regularly since, as well as enjoying some classic war games like Third Reich and Dawn Patrol. Martin has dabbled in every trend that has hit the market except collectible card games, as he said “I was too long an old fart to play them (laugh).”

Jeff Martin (born 1965) is an American game designer and entrepreneur best known as the founder of True Adventures and President of Dwarven Forge from 2004 to 2014.