Forums

Your guild's forum lives under Forums in the dashboard. Members read and post there, and any category you mark public also shows on your guild website, where anyone can read it. This article covers setting up categories, moderating, reports, search and Discord announcements. For formatting posts, see forum shortcodes.

Plan your categories first

A forum with three busy categories feels more alive than one with twelve empty ones. Start small and add categories when a topic keeps coming up.

Here are some layouts that work well:

Each category has two rank settings:

• Who can read: the lowest rank that can open the category.
• Who can post: the lowest rank that can start threads and reply. It can never be lower than the read rank, since you can't post where you can't read.

Ranks are your in-game ranks (see roles and ranks). An "Officers only" category is simply one where Who can read is set to your officer rank. Moderators, admins and the owner can read and moderate every category, whatever its rank settings.

Create a category

Owners and admins manage categories.

1. Open Forums.
2. Click the gear at the top right to turn on moderator tools. The button now reads Moderating.
3. Click New category.
4. Fill in Name (up to 80 characters) and Description (up to 300).
5. Choose Who can read and Who can post. The lowest rank is marked "(everyone)".
6. Tick Public if anyone should be able to read it on your website.
7. Click Create category.

To change or remove a category later, turn on the gear and use Edit or Delete on its row.

Public categories: your best recruiting tool

A public category can be read by anyone on your website at /forum, with no account needed. Visitors see your discussions in your site's theme, with your home page's menu at the top. The website forum is read-only: visitors see a "Members: sign in to join in" link, and posting still needs the rank you set.

Public categories are perfect for:

• Announcements and patch-day plans that show your guild is active.
• Raid or op reports that show what joining is like.
• A "How to join" thread that links to your application form (see recruitment).

Keep anything you wouldn't want a stranger to read in a non-public category.

The moderator tools gear

Moderators, admins and the owner see a gear at the top right of the Forums page, each category and each thread. It shows or hides moderator tools.

• It's off by default, so you read the forum the way members do.
• Your choice is remembered in this browser. Turn it on once on your officer PC and it stays on.
• When it's on, the button reads Moderating.

With the gear on you get:

Members always keep their own tools, gear or no gear:

• Edit on their own posts while the thread is unlocked.
• Delete on their own replies.
• Rename on their own thread while it's unlocked.
• Delete thread on their own thread while nobody has replied yet.

Pin, lock, move, rename and delete

• Pin keeps a thread at the top of its category. Pin rules, schedules and "read me first" threads.
• Lock stops replies. Only moderators can reply in a locked thread, and authors can no longer edit their posts in it.
• Move to sends the thread to another category. It shows when there's more than one category.
• Rename fixes a vague title (up to 150 characters).
• Delete thread removes the whole thread and all its replies. The opening post can't be deleted on its own; delete the thread instead.

A deleted reply leaves a short "This post was removed." note in the thread, so the conversation still makes sense.

Reports and the Moderation page

Any member can click Report on someone else's post and say why (up to 500 characters). Reports go to Moderation under Admin in the sidebar, which moderators, admins and the owner can open.

The page has three tabs:

• Open reports: each report with the reason, who sent it, a link to the thread and the post itself. Click Keep post (dismiss) or Remove post.
• Handled: reports already dealt with, and by whom.
• Moderation log: a record of moderator actions, such as categories created, threads pinned, locked, moved, renamed or deleted, posts removed and reports dismissed.

Search the forum

The search box sits at the top of the Forums page once you have a category.

• Type words to find posts that contain all of them.
• Put a phrase in quotes, like "world boss", to match it exactly.
• Put a minus before a word, like -wipe, to leave out posts with it.

Searches need 2 to 200 characters. Each result links straight to the post. Members only find posts in categories they can read. Spoilers are hidden in result snippets.

Limits

Announce threads on Discord

If your Discord server is connected, Spawnix can post new threads to your announcements channel. Only threads started in a public category are announced, because the channel may be readable by people outside your guild. The post shows the title, the start of the opening post (with spoilers replaced by "(spoiler)") and a Read thread button that opens it on your website. Turn it on with New threads in public forum categories in Discord setup.

Tips and tricks

• Pin a short "Forum rules" thread in each public category and lock it, so it stays tidy and always on top.
• Make an "Announcements" category that everyone can read but only officers can post in. Set Who can read to the lowest rank and Who can post to your officer rank.
• Turn the gear off when you're just reading. You won't hit Delete by accident, and you see exactly what members see.
• Before deleting an off-topic thread, try Move to and a Rename. Members feel heard, and the forum stays organized.
• Use quotes in search for item and boss names with spaces, like "Molten Core", to cut out noise.
• Press G then F anywhere in the dashboard to jump to the forums.