hawkeyefan
Legend
I think I somewhat disagree. I don't necessarily consider my notes completely immutable, but I do need a very good reason to disregard them. Primarily for reasons of verisimilitude, as I described.
I think plenty of interesting play experiences can arise from sticking to your notes. Having to deal with an offended baron isn't necessarily any less interesting than having the Captain depose him.
Yeah, I’m not saying to always abandon your notes. If you have ideas that are engaging and don’t disrupt the flow of the game, have at it. I prep when I run 5E, so I’m not anti-prep.
What I mean by “hold on loosely”, is more along the lines of treating your prep as a rough draft. Maybe it’s as awesome as the game is likely to get....in which case, yeah run it as is! In other cases, it may not be as good as it can be. If so, leave yourself the option to change things.
Nothing’s set in stone until it’s introduced in play. (And technically it’s not even set in stone then, either, but @Lanefan may hear me say that and if so, the thread will have yet another tangent). So until it’s established in play, everything is mutable.
I know that making a change on the fly could have larger ramifications for other things you’ve planned. Two things on that. One, it’s okay...you’ll get it all to work. Two, maybe consider not prepping so far in advance.
Personally, I think a big part of the issue given in the OP is that the DM tried to adhere too strongly to the way the Baron is presented in the book. Had he changed things a bit, sure they may have contradicted the book....but the game may not have suffered this disruption to play. The players aren’t going to read the book after and then say “hey that Baron wasn’t as implacable as he should have been WTF?!?!”
Your notes are no different.
So I’m not saying not to prep, and not to let things play out per the things you’ve prepped. But consider how and what you prepare, and then consider the flow of play at the table, and how the PCs have influenced or changed things, or how they’ve reacted to the fictional world. Change things if it makes sense to do so, or if playing them out as expected will be a problem.