As long as the content and pacing of the plot fits its duration, I don't have much of a preference one way or the other. I'll give a couple of examples, if it'll help.
A friend of mine is planning an "arc" for their character that will consist of only two events -- one to travel to the destination and investigate, one to fight the bad guys and recover. To simply recover an artifact from a verified location, learn a bit of backstory, fight somebody, and leave? That's adequate.
On the flip side, the last arc I planned consisted of tracking down a person who the group was sure was in certain danger, as well as the artifact they had presumably stolen. So a series of investigations and interrogations needed to be done, as well as covering travel (because our group does many camping scenes). Doing all of that, fighting the antagonist, and dealing with the fallout took about a month.
I definitely know that there are people out there who prefer for every arc to take months, because there is sort of this implication that length is an indicator of quality/dynamism. However, I do not believe that the longer a story takes to tell, the more "epic" it necessarily is (or even has to be)! And trying to schedule things around people who are hard to grab, or an FC/LS that you don't want to detract too much time away from, certainly can be difficult or confusing. So one may feel compelled to keep things short and sweet out of courtesy. I totally get that.
But as long as everyone involved is engaged, feels included, and you all are enjoying the plot? Then you typically won't have to concern yourself with the duration overly much. And if you're still unsure, you can always just ask your partners for feedback.
A friend of mine is planning an "arc" for their character that will consist of only two events -- one to travel to the destination and investigate, one to fight the bad guys and recover. To simply recover an artifact from a verified location, learn a bit of backstory, fight somebody, and leave? That's adequate.
On the flip side, the last arc I planned consisted of tracking down a person who the group was sure was in certain danger, as well as the artifact they had presumably stolen. So a series of investigations and interrogations needed to be done, as well as covering travel (because our group does many camping scenes). Doing all of that, fighting the antagonist, and dealing with the fallout took about a month.
I definitely know that there are people out there who prefer for every arc to take months, because there is sort of this implication that length is an indicator of quality/dynamism. However, I do not believe that the longer a story takes to tell, the more "epic" it necessarily is (or even has to be)! And trying to schedule things around people who are hard to grab, or an FC/LS that you don't want to detract too much time away from, certainly can be difficult or confusing. So one may feel compelled to keep things short and sweet out of courtesy. I totally get that.
But as long as everyone involved is engaged, feels included, and you all are enjoying the plot? Then you typically won't have to concern yourself with the duration overly much. And if you're still unsure, you can always just ask your partners for feedback.
