There are shounen tropes and general island arc steps, which makes me expect certain things to happen. But the question is "how", as "how is really unpredictable.
Example: do we know for sure Luffy will get a power up? Yes. Could anyone predict Nika Looney tunes Piece? Not really.
Same with the island arcs. We can always expect some conflict happening and the island either being better off after SHP visit (Alabasta, Skypeia, Wano, Dressrosa), or nor really but the SHP goal was reached (WCI, Enies Lobby, Sabaody#2).
That's why it is a mix, but in general I lean mostly to "unpredictable", because there's still so much we don't know lore-wise, and the particulars of expected events are also not always clear.