Forum Permissions

Should forum permissions respect the category?

I have a staff category with is admin & mod only

I have staff room subforum which is admin & mod only

I create a sub sub forum for moderators but never changed permission and gave everyone access.

I know XF for example respects the root category. Is this an oversight or designed this way?

This is by design: Every forum keeps its own permissions, and a sub-forum doesn't inherit them from its category or parent. A new forum starts open to all groups, whatever it sits under. Hiding the category hides it from the forum list, but the sub-forum is still reachable on its own. To lock your moderators' forum down, go to ACP → Forums → edit that forum and untick View/Read for every group except Admin and Mod.

I do see the flaw here nonetheless, so I will most likely adjust this properly in 2.1.