A few favourites from the Alexandrian:

• Don’t prep plots. Prep scenarios. If you give the players a goal and a world, they will make the plot themselves, and it’ll be more interesting. And it’s not like you wouldn’t need those things for a railroad plot anyway.
• Don’t plan contingencies. Instead of explaining everything the party could do to get past the guard, just describe the guard. It’s a lot more flexible, and it takes less time to prepare.
• With the 3 clues rule, make sure to have different clue types. If all your clues are pieces of evidence, then a party who prefers to talk to people is clueless.
• If you feel the need to ask “are you sure you want to do that”, there might be a miscommunication to figure out. Maybe you didn’t explain the situation clearly, or a player misheard you, or the player has an item to help things work out.
• When creating a system within your setting (eg, nobility), add two exceptions to the neat and tidy rules. “Each region is ruled by a count, except for those over there which are ruled by comtes.” This adds history to your world while making it less daunting to add more exceptions if you need them later.

I found a map-making site that is, let’s be honest, shit. The maps it makes can only ever be “good enough”, and never great. This means I don’t waste time trying to make them great, and can actually finish the dang things. Plus, if the players decide not to go to the noble manor, then it’s no big loss.

This idea goes for a lot of the game, actually. If you spend less time on the story, then it’s no big loss if the plot takes a tangent. And they probably weren’t going to be as invested in a forced narrative as they would be for something more organic.