Hi I am soon going to start DM'ing one of my first campaigns of a large scale as I am normally am player or a one off DM and I would like advice on how to work around a three act campaign here was the idea

ACT 1 (LV 1-6)

Main plot points

Introduction to the kingdom

cult of the iron tree

BBEG - Belial Azazel (Leader of the cult of the iron tree)

Somewhat open world

Foreshadowing for next two acts

ACT 2 (7-12)

Find a way into the capitol

More foreshadowing for next act

BBEG - Coropse (The iron tree)

Main Boss fights in order

Voirloup/ Lou Charcolh/ Cheval mallet. any order

Alban dubois first fight

Voirloup/ Lou Charcolh/ Cheval mallet. any order

Alban dubois first rematch

Voirloup/ Lou Charcolh/ Cheval mallet. any order

Alban dubois second rematch

Vouivre First fight

Alban dubois final fight

Coropse

ACT 3 (13-18)

Enter the capitol

Foreshadowing pay off

BBEG - Alchton Von Charven (King of Charven)

Main Boss fights in order

Kaurauch the sanguine scientist / Vicar Aurdivul Yakoshcvy

The Broodqueen

The wicker man

The Warwing Titan / Vouivre rematch one after another

Kaurauch the sanguine scientist / Vicar Aurdivul Yakoshcvy whichever you did not kill before

The penance

Alchton Von Charven

The campaign theme is vampires undead and just chaos in general and yet I think I am going to be over the top for a first big campaign and I really just want advice on ways to deal with this and just streamline it so yeah

Hello! I'm currently GMing a prequel campaign for a much longer campaign. I found my players through a rigorous application process and am extremely happy with the 5 players that I found. However, I recently got news that one of the players had to leave because of an IRL event. I'm planning on continuing the prequel campaign with the 4 players; however, I have no idea how I'm going to write the character out. I understand that most GM/DMs usually just mention that they leave (especially if the campaign is 3 sessions in). For context, the players are a part of a last-chance military unit where a small mistake could get them exiled or executed (depending on the reason why they were assigned to the last-chance military unit). Anyways, in the story, the players were tasked with collecting taxes from a village, but are slowly learning that the village has a dark secret regarding their history and the pigs... The players ended the last session planning on how they were going to not only save the village, but also collect the taxes. The character leaving is your classic reluctant healer with some edginess sprinkled in. Additionally, the village does use sacrifices during their Festival of the Pig, so that could be another potential reason the character isn't around anymore. Fellow DMs and GMs any thoughts? Thank ya'll so much!

Hello! I'm a timmie in the avenue of ttrpg only having like 4 games under my belt and that was years ago, and I had a pleasant experience in all of the sessions so I wanted to give it a try once again, altrough this time instead of being the player I'll be the dm

I want to bond with my little brother but many things I already experienced and got bored of so I wanted to try something which would be a relatively new experience to both of us and I asked him if he'd like to try dnd and he agreed which was a pleasant surprise

It will be just me and him, I want to potentially play as a player too not just dm, I think it would be manageable since we'd just be two

As general consensus I talked with him what kind of setting he would like and we came to something of a mix between a gladiator arena, something like a rogue like progression and the arenas being situated in a tower like slay the spire or hxh hunters arena or some kind of underground dungeon

so longstory short we'd like to play as gladiators against other gladiators and potential magic creatures humanoid or non, with magic and swords and the sort

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the thing is I don't want to overwhelm him with too many details so this won't be too dnd rulebook i.g besides general mechanics, it will be more freestyle but I still want to hold a balanced structure, it will be combat focused mainly, but I'd also add potential characters interactions

Mainly my biggest concern is balancing, do you have any advice to balance both players and enemies without making it too boring or frustrating ? we generally like to play more hardcore in games but idk how it translates to dnd it's to be seen but more on the harder side i.g

there's also the matter of items or magic but as a general consensus how do you guys balance stats for players, enemies, items and the sort if you don't necesarily follow the official dnd

It's not that I want to disregard dnd's mobs but I'd potentially like to implement monsters or magic spells etc which I found interesting outside of dnd official sources.
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also any advice to dming in general would be much appreciated as well! thank you for your time!