Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
Sometimes. Not always. And certaintly not a universal rule or maxim. We are easily swimming in examples where this is not the case. This is also ignoring how some series have preset lengths. E.g., Babylon 5 was planned for five seasons, though the narrative structure had a major hiccup due to TNT. Avatar the Last Airbender was planned for three seasons: Book 1, Water; Book 2, Earth; Book 3, Fire.
I did forget pre-planned shorter series that avoid the issue via planning.
Calling it a False Equivalence doesn't make it so. This is generally how D&D uses monsters for artifically escalating drama -- at least through the common D&D lens of equating dramatic moments to PCs overcoming challenging foes -- to the point where you eventually fight demon princes and gods or become ones yourself. And drama in a number of fantasy/sci-fi series often likewise involves escalating foes. This is even one reason why people wanted something akin to "bounded accuracy" so that lower-tiered monsters of the week would remain dramatically relevant in later gameplay.
And yet it still is a False Equivalence. Monster difficulty isn't about trying to outdo the last monster.
Shows regularly die regardless of their dramatic content for a variety of reasons (production costs, ratings, network marketing and rebranding, actors, writer fatigue, etc.) so that is a red herring. How many episodes does Bold and the Beautiful have?
Yes, your Red Herring here is in fact red. Kind of you to notice and call it out like that. Yes, there are other ways that a show could end before getting to the point where it drowns in its own drama.
How many episodes did the original CSI have? Or how about Law & Order? Or how about Doctor Who?
Crime shows are different and Dr. Who is more of a comedy than it is a drama. But okay, there are some exceptions to the rule. They don't invalidate the rule.
Maxperson: Lanefan is saying uniequivocally that the dramatic-drive play that [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] and others describe is unsustainable for 100+ sessions. This is demonstrably false. Your defending of this falsehood seems rooted more in a desire to bicker and win points than to ascertain the truth of the proposition. I sometimes think that if I casually said that the earth was round, you would go out of your way to become a flat earther. If you are interested in the truth of things, then why would you defend Lanefan's assertion here if you know this to be false? (Pemerton's chronicled story now sessions are hardly esoteric gnosis. And he is hardly alone in long campaigns in story now games.) Is this really an argument you want to be making with any shred of good faith?
I'm not defending him at all, which is why you find a lack of "I think Lanefan is right" and the like in my post. I think you can do 100+ or more just fine. You just have to find people who enjoy that sort of thing. Me, I find that sort of incessant drama to be ridiculously unrealistic.