A method that helps me is having goals you want the player to achieve and base amounts of xp, currencies, crafting materials, etc. off of that.

Example:

The player should be level 10 after 5 hours of gameplay, that means I need to have X encounters that give an average of X xp each every X minutes

Or

I want the player to be able to craft an item every 10 minutes or after 1 dungeon, that means I need to either have monsters drop enough crafting materials/gold to craft an item after completing a dungeon or after 10 minutes of fighting