As long as it needs to last.
I both run and participate in a few story arcs for my FC (and have had a few personal arcs that weren't run by a DM and were driven primarily just by character dynamics) and ultimately the perfect 'length' of an arc depends on the arc, in my opinion. A simple story without a lot of twists or turns could easily be wrapped up in a month or two if everyone could dedicate themselves to having an event per week for it (which is kind of unrealistic for the groups I run with and would involve overworking the DMs to the point of it not being fun anymore; we usually do one major event per arc per month). A more complicated story with more factors involved could take a year, and that's fine too as long as everyone involved is enjoying the story.
For example, an arc involving finding someone's lost pet probably wouldn't take as long to resolve as an arc involving infiltrating and destroying a band of spies feeding the Imperials information about the Immortal Flames.
(In this regard, story arc length is also as long as people let or make it be; things will take longer if the cast of characters involved simply doesn't have the necessary skills to tackle a problem as it arises versus characters who have been there and done that and kind of know how to fangle a solution out from past experiences.)
Speaking personally, the FC story arc that I'm running has gone on for a little over three months with varying event frequency, being kicked off by a previous event chain that only lasted about a month and a half because I was trying to run an event every two weeks and it was making me crazy (since I was also trying to run an event for my LS every two weeks at that point; they were both heist-style arcs). So altogether, four and a half months, though I'm not planning on running anything major this month because of holidays and finals. And we're only about halfway done; assuming no interruptions and a willing cast of characters, I think it won't properly wrap up until around the beginning of May at this pace.
There's another arc being run by another officer that's just gotten started and is on hold for similar reasons (holidays and finals) that I don't anticipate running for as long as the arc I'm in charge of has and probably will, but that's mostly because we're like three events in and unless there's some huge twist or more to do after the current arc is resolved, I'm not sure that stretching it out would be possible or wise.
By contrast -- and this is probably en example of what not to do -- I was involved in a character arc toward the beginning of my character that probably should have ended a few weeks after it started on the basis of my character's trust in this other character was completely and totally thrown out the window. He hated them and there was nothing that was really gonna be done about that. It didn't end up actually ending until the other character "died" (as far as he knew -- the door is open for them to have survived but irregardless Leonnaux is done with this character no matter what so the arc functionally ends there) several months later, after continual bouts of harassment and trying to make up for what she did (which is One Of Those Things, you know, that You Can't Fix Or Make-Up For Ever. Yeah, it was that thing.) So an arc that should have been done in a few weeks lasted several months instead.
I both run and participate in a few story arcs for my FC (and have had a few personal arcs that weren't run by a DM and were driven primarily just by character dynamics) and ultimately the perfect 'length' of an arc depends on the arc, in my opinion. A simple story without a lot of twists or turns could easily be wrapped up in a month or two if everyone could dedicate themselves to having an event per week for it (which is kind of unrealistic for the groups I run with and would involve overworking the DMs to the point of it not being fun anymore; we usually do one major event per arc per month). A more complicated story with more factors involved could take a year, and that's fine too as long as everyone involved is enjoying the story.
For example, an arc involving finding someone's lost pet probably wouldn't take as long to resolve as an arc involving infiltrating and destroying a band of spies feeding the Imperials information about the Immortal Flames.
(In this regard, story arc length is also as long as people let or make it be; things will take longer if the cast of characters involved simply doesn't have the necessary skills to tackle a problem as it arises versus characters who have been there and done that and kind of know how to fangle a solution out from past experiences.)
Speaking personally, the FC story arc that I'm running has gone on for a little over three months with varying event frequency, being kicked off by a previous event chain that only lasted about a month and a half because I was trying to run an event every two weeks and it was making me crazy (since I was also trying to run an event for my LS every two weeks at that point; they were both heist-style arcs). So altogether, four and a half months, though I'm not planning on running anything major this month because of holidays and finals. And we're only about halfway done; assuming no interruptions and a willing cast of characters, I think it won't properly wrap up until around the beginning of May at this pace.
There's another arc being run by another officer that's just gotten started and is on hold for similar reasons (holidays and finals) that I don't anticipate running for as long as the arc I'm in charge of has and probably will, but that's mostly because we're like three events in and unless there's some huge twist or more to do after the current arc is resolved, I'm not sure that stretching it out would be possible or wise.
By contrast -- and this is probably en example of what not to do -- I was involved in a character arc toward the beginning of my character that probably should have ended a few weeks after it started on the basis of my character's trust in this other character was completely and totally thrown out the window. He hated them and there was nothing that was really gonna be done about that. It didn't end up actually ending until the other character "died" (as far as he knew -- the door is open for them to have survived but irregardless Leonnaux is done with this character no matter what so the arc functionally ends there) several months later, after continual bouts of harassment and trying to make up for what she did (which is One Of Those Things, you know, that You Can't Fix Or Make-Up For Ever. Yeah, it was that thing.) So an arc that should have been done in a few weeks lasted several months instead.
