The discussion is about restricting replies to a certain group of users on a Discourse forum. richy_zimmerman wants to create a forum where students can create topics but only reply to their own topics, while consultants can reply to any post and create topics. merefield explained that this is not possible out of the box due to the way permissions work in Discourse, but a plugin could achieve this.
richy_zimmerman clarified that he would have multiple categories with subcategories and two user groups with different permissions. merefield confirmed that this is not possible without a plugin and provided a screenshot of the out-of-the-box group permission sets.
richy_zimmerman decided to look for a custom plugin and posted in the marketplace. merefield guaranteed that a plugin could be made to achieve this and encouraged sticking with Discourse.
richy_zimmerman asked for an estimate of the plugin’s cost, and merefield offered to PM his take on it. pfaffman explained that changing the permission level from category to topic would be difficult and estimated the cost to be at least $5,000.
However, JammyDodger suggested that the Discourse Restricted Replies plugin may be able to achieve the desired functionality.
I want to make a forum for students and consultants.
Students: can create topics, only reply to their OWN topic they’ve created
Consultants: can reply to any post, can create topics
is this possible? The whole value add of our forum would actually be that you can ONLY get help from consultants, similar to the Q&A board on Avvo.com
says post withdrawn? were you wrong? @merefield
Sorry in my haste I didn’t notice one restriction you included:
In a Category there’s no way to prevent someone from replying to a Topic they did not create.
‘Reply’ permission covers an entire Category and all its Topics
Out of the box there is no way to do what you want to achieve.
A plugin could achieve that. Marketplace is your friend 
@merefield I’d have 4 categories
Category A
Cateogry B
Category C
Category D
within those categories there would be several subcategories.
user group 1 can only create topics and reply to their OWN topics.
User group 2 can reply to any topic and create topics.
this is not possible without a plugin? do you think a plugin could be made for this if its not possible?
I see. Thanks. Looks like I’ll need a custom plugin. Where else could I find a programmer for this plugin?
You are well served here because of the domain expertise. I may even bid but tied up presently :).
I posted in marketplace. Thanks. If they can’t do it, looks like I’ll need Xenforo :\
Plugins have almost unlimited control so I guarantee it will be possible.
Stick with Discourse, it rocks.
Do you have any estimate for how much this plugin might cost?
I’ll PM you my take on it.
Permissions are at the category level. You want them at the topic level. Changing that will be very difficult.
Dang. Is this limitation exclusive to just Discourse, or do other forums support this?
Do you have a cost estimate to add this on Discourse? It’s definitely the best forum potential IMO.
Topic only permissions are going to be at least $5k and will be expensive to maintain.
You could have students submit their questions and then have them moved or approved into a category that they cannot post in, but they will not be able to reply.
My recommendation would be either enforce the ‘only consultants can reply’ retirement with community norms (just tell students not to reply) or give up allowing students to reply. If they need to add more info they could edit their original post.
I think this may be possible now with our Restricted Replies plugin:
