Campaigns vs Modules

Understanding Mimir’s two-level hierarchy for organizing your D&D games.

The Problem

When preparing a D&D campaign, you’re managing two different scopes:

Campaign-level - The overarching story, recurring characters, world lore
Adventure-level - Specific dungeons, encounters, session content

Mixing these creates chaos: Where do you put the goblin boss? Under the campaign? But he’s only in this dungeon. What about the recurring villain? She appears in multiple adventures.

Mimir’s Solution

Mimir separates these concerns:

Campaigns contain:

World-building and lore
Recurring NPCs
Player characters
The overarching story

Modules contain:

Specific adventures
Maps and encounters
Location-specific monsters
Session prep documents

Why This Works

Reusability

A module like “Goblin Cave” can be:

Used in multiple campaigns
Run for different groups
Adapted and improved over time

Focus

When preparing for Tuesday’s session:

Open the relevant module
See only what you need
Don’t wade through campaign-wide content

Organization

As your campaign grows:

Add new modules without cluttering old ones
Archive completed adventures
Track progress by module

Practical Examples

A Published Adventure

Running “Lost Mine of Phandelver”:

Campaign: “Phandelver Campaign”
Module 1: “Goblin Arrows” (ambush + Cragmaw Hideout)
Module 2: “Phandalin” (town exploration)
Module 3: “Cragmaw Castle”
Module 4: “Wave Echo Cave”

A Homebrew Campaign

Your original world:

Campaign: “The Shattered Realms”
Module 1: “The Haunted Mine” (first adventure)
Module 2: “Festival of Shadows” (town event)
Module 3: “Dragon’s Lair” (climax)

One-Shots

Even one-shots benefit:

Campaign: “One-Shot Collection”
Module 1: “Goblin Heist”
Module 2: “Murder Mystery”
Module 3: “Dragon Hunt”

When to Use Each

Put in the Campaign

Setting information
Recurring NPCs
Player character assignments
World maps
Faction details

Put in the Module

Dungeon maps
Encounter monsters
Location-specific NPCs
Session prep documents
Read-aloud text

The Boundary Cases

Some content could go either way:

Major villain - Campaign NPC, appears in multiple modules Dungeon boss - Module monster, only in that adventure Town shopkeeper - Could be either, depends on recurrence

When in doubt: If you’ll reference it in multiple modules, put it in the campaign. If it’s session-specific, put it in the module.

Benefits for Long Campaigns

As campaigns run for months or years:

Modules act as “chapters” you can reference
Old modules preserve their state
New modules start fresh
Campaign-level content evolves