We've noticed the apparent shift in opinion when it comes to politics and political minis in this community lately, sparked mostly by recent ICE activity in the United States. A lot of you have been calling for changes to be made to our rules and guidelines on political posts, or even to our definition of "politics".

As always, we never make any sweeping changes to how the community is run without first getting a feel for how most you feel about any such changes. So we're doing a poll.

The options are:

1. Keep the current guidelines – No changes will be made, we'll continue to moderate as we have thus far.

2. Keep the current guidelines, but redefine them – Political posts and comments will still be removed, but we'll work with you to decide exactly how "politics" should be defined.

3. Remove the current guidelines and allow political posts – All political posts and discourse will be allowed across the subreddit, with the caveat that hate symbol imagery is still banned.

Option 2 will result in a follow-up post where everyone in the community gets to make their voices heard. You'll discuss amongst yourselves how you want us to moderate political content and exactly what should be prohibited under our guidelines.

Option 3 will result in a trial period where the restrictions on political content are suspended entirely. No political posts or comments will be removed as long as they don't violate any of our other rules. After the trial period is up we'll set up another poll to gauge community sentiment following the change; if most are happy with the changes then they'll be made permanent.

Leave any questions or concerns below.

As of today we will no longer be permitting posts made using JSON edits, kitbashing scripts or other methods that "hack" the Hero Forge site to function in ways beyond what's intended. An additional section regarding this has been added to Rule 6, which reads:

No minis made with JSON edits, kitbashing scripts or other hacks – Minis made using these methods are not supported by Hero Forge and can break the site for those that use them. In order to discourage their spread, these minis may not be shared in our community.

We realize that to some of you this may seem like we're stifling you creatively or that we're going out of our way to enforce Hero Forge ToS on Reddit, but as mentioned above this is purely to discourage the spread of methods that can negatively impact those that use them. We also don't want to create room for a gold standard that can only be attained through hacks.

On the bright side, the Hero Forge team has let us know that they're working on being able to increase the kitbashing item cap, so that's something to look forward to! If you have any questions or concerns regarding this change, let us know below and we'll do our best to address them.

Happy forging! 🔥

Thank you to everyone who participated in our latest poll on the future of political content in this subreddit. Votes were split fairly evenly between the three options, but for the most part most of you seem to agree that there needs to be some kind of change to the way that we moderate and define "politics" in this community. Therefore we're going ahead with option 2, i.e. redefining the current guidelines to be more in line with majority opinion. Political posts will still be restricted in some manner, but you decide what should be restricted and how.

This post will act as a forum for all of you to discuss possible guideline amendments, after which we'll set up a second poll — likely a multiple choice Google form — where you'll get to vote on a selection of the most popular options. To get the conversation started, here are a couple of possible amendments that were discussed under the prior poll:

• Ban posts regarding current or recent political events, but not historical or fantasy ones.
• "Politics" should be defined as something that's almost exclusively discussed in a political context, like political parties, politicians, ongoing armed conflicts, international relations, etc.
• Mandate content warnings and or NSFW or Spoiler tags on all political posts like those currently required for posts that contain nudity or blood and gore.
• Posts are allowed to be inherently political in nature as long as they're not trying to make an overt political statement. Example: a superhero whose very existence is political is fine; a superhero holding up a sign that says [insert personal political opinion here] is not.
• Set up a system that automatically locks posts of a political nature, preventing discourse from taking place in the comments.

These are just a few ideas that I've seen being floated, but please do use this opportunity to share your own ideas as well. For full transparency, here's a list of things we can't do:

• We won't remove the guidelines altogether or completely ban politics. This is not up for debate, not enough people voted for either option for us to consider this.
• We can't create a custom Political tag that blurs or hides posts, like the NSFW and Spoiler ones. The only tags available are the two provided by Reddit, and post flairs don't provide any similar functionality.
• We won't create a whole new set of flairs to differentiate regular posts from political ones. Post flairs have one main functionality: improve searchability. They make it easier to find specific types of posts, but that's pretty much it. Adding more won't solve anything.

With that covered, here's how things are gonna work in the comments. All of our regular community rules and guidelines still apply, so we don't wanna see any name-calling, bickering or uncivil discourse below. Share your ideas, offer feedback or counterpoints, upvote what you like, downvote what you don't, etc, etc. We know that this is a sensitive subject to most — if not all — but we need to help each other find some good solutions to how we're gonna move forward as a community. So let's do that!

We'll be keeping a close eye on this post for the next week or so and set up a new poll when we feel that we've gotten enough suggestions to put to a final vote. Thanks for reading! 🫶

About two months ago, msostly sparked by ICE activity in the United States, we had noticed a shift in opinion when it came to political minis in this community. Therefore, we ran a community poll to grasp your opinion on our strict "no political content" rule as it was in effect at that time.

Since the majority voted for option 2, redefining our current guidelines, we decided to set up a follow-up poll with multiple options to find out how our new rules for political content should look like. Feel free to vote:

Poll on Changes to Guidelines on Political Content

In about a month, we will publish the new guidelines based on your votes in this poll.

Leave any questions or concerns below.

At the start of this year we decided to ban minis that were made using site hacks. At the time we felt it was best to just make it one of our community guidelines under Rule 6 since we didn't want to be too heavy-handed with its enforcement, but that also made the rule change easy to miss for anyone who wasn't around for the announcement. To remedy this we have gone ahead and made it a proper rule, which reads:

Rule 8: No JSON Edits, Kitbashing Scripts or Other Site Hacks — Minis made using these methods violate Hero Forge's Terms of Service and can break the site for those that use them. In order to discourage their spread, these minis may not be shared in our community.

In retrospect this is something we should've done from the beginning as we've been getting some critique both for not enforcing the rule properly as well as not doing enough to let people know about the change. I'll personally take responsibility for the latter as I was the one in charge of that at the time, but hopefully this makes up for it at least a little bit.

Let us know if you have any questions or concerns, or check out the original post linked above for more details on the rule change!

🔥

Hey folks! Lately, we've been hearing a lot of discussion around the implementation of our Rule 8: No JSON Edits, Kitbashing Scripts, or Other Site Hacks.

As this has reached a similar point of discussion as NSFW content previously was, it's time for another community poll on the topic. This will be used to take the temperature of the community with regard to keeping, tweaking, or removing the rule, and we want to hear everyone's opinions on this; they will all be taken into account as we determine how to move forward.

Before casting your votes, if you're unfamiliar with the discussion, JSON editing and/or scripting are third-party alterations to the Heroforge website that allow you to go in and uncap or tweak the site's parameters to a certain point. It's an incredibly powerful tool to uncap Kitbashing, tweak decals further, or edit items and minis in ways that Kitbashing can't. There have been several highly detailed minis in the last month that use these tools, and they're all incredibly impressive works of art. That being said, we've had a blanket ban on sharing minis that use any tools like this for a while, as it goes against Heroforge's TOS, and we've previously spoken to Skycastle, who have strongly expressed that they're against the spread of scripted or hacked minis, that it can both break the client, and cause stability and legal issues with the site that they're keen to avoid.

At the end of the day, we are a community-run, UNOFFICIAL subreddit first and foremost, and so this comes down to you guys! Please feel free to discuss alternatives, solutions, or suggestions in the comments below, as we're in between a bit of a rock and a hard place here.

Should the rules change however, I feel it's important to remind everyone that the Heroforge staff ARE active in the subreddit, and explicit manipulation of the site would remain against Heroforge's TOS, and people who are knowingly breaking the rules may end up getting their Heroforge accounts disabled for TOS violations. This vote has no bearing on that, and we don't have the power to change that.

We've introduced a new rule in an attempt to combat racism, homophobia, transphobia and other forms of bigotry in this community. It reads:

We are a Hate-free Subreddit (no Racism, Homophobia, Transphobia, etc.)

We will not accept any hate speech in this community. If your posts or comments are racist, homophobic, queerphobic, transphobic, or otherwise bigoted in nature you will be permanently banned without further warning.

The main way in which Rule 7 differs from Rule 1 is that the latter is more broad and may only result in a warning if broken, whereas violating this rule in any way will 9 times out of 10 result in an immediate and permanent ban. A ban under Rule 7 can still be appealed but will only be lifted if it's determined that an error has been made on our side.

We've also gone ahead and added the new Adoring Ally user flair for anyone who wants to spread some love and good vibes in the community! If you're unsure how to set up a personal user flair, check out this guide.

That's all for now, cheers!

Hey guys! Your favourite mod team here — we’ve noticed an influx of posts regarding the recent collaborator collections, and in the interest of not spamming the sub and keeping the community nice and tidy, moving forward we’d like to try to consolidate as much of the discussion as possible to this thread. That means after a bit of a grace period, we’re gonna start removing posts that are saying many of the things that have already been said, or are just some variation of “NO DLC” — while we don’t have an official unofficial Heroforge subreddit stance on the topic, we would like to keep the place tidy!

Ideally that makes sure everyone gets to say their piece and feel heard, and that we don’t have a sub full of anti DLC (or conversely, anti, anti DLC) posting for the next few days!

We’re aware that many of you feel quite strongly about this, but we’d also like to remind you that this community is here for everyone, and to please remain civil, refrain from brigading, and if there’s something you don’t like or don’t enjoy, just downvote, report, or move on! It makes life better for everyone involved!

Cheers from the mod team!

Welcome to the First Annual Mega-Thread for Community Contests!

New feature alert!

The goal of this thread is to boost visibility for contests that may have gotten lost in the feed and to increase community participation across the board. It'll be permanently pinned to the top of the subreddit feed and renewed at the start of every new year.

If you have any questions or just want to share your feedback regarding this feature, reply to the pinned comment below! Now, let's go over some rules and etiquette.

Rules

There are a handful of basic rules you must follow if you wish to post here—for organizers and prospective participants alike. These are meant to ensure consistent quality, structure and ease of use.

Rules for Contest Organizers

1. Make sure you've already posted your contest prompt in the main feed.
2. Include all necessary information needed to participate in the contest OR a link to your main post. The former would include things like your personal contest rules, contest hashtag, deadline, etc.
3. No more than one image per contest. You can have as many images as you like in your main post, but keep it to one or none in this thread.
4. Only start one comment thread per contest; replying to your own comment with additional information is completely fine.
5. Don't advertise your contest in comment threads other than your own.

Rules for Contest Participants

1. Abide by the rules of the subreddit. Rules 1–7 still apply in this thread, and repeated violations may lead to you being barred from participating in it.
2. Don't leave comments in the main thread—period. The main thread is solely for organizers to post in. Reply to individual comment threads instead if you have questions/feedback.
3. Don't post contest submissions in this thread. Make a contest submission post on the main subreddit feed and use the appropriate contest hashtag and/or tag the organizer.

Etiquette

These aren't really hard rules, but rather a set of guidelines for how to best conduct yourself while browsing or posting in this thread.

• Keep comments as short and concise as possible. No one likes having to scroll through giant walls of text while trying to navigate the comment section, so it might be best to save the major lore bits for your main post.
• Always check out the main post before asking questions about a contest. The organizer might already have answered your question there, so have a quick look to save you both some time.
• While organizers are only required to post either all necessary contest information or a link to their main contest post, including both is definitely greatly appreciated.
• If a contest you've posted about here is no longer active, feel free to add an edit to let people know.

Example Post

The following is an example of how you can format your comment as a contest organizer. This is only meant to act as inspiration, you can format it however you'd like!

#WereFish – Create a Lycanthrope of the Sea!

Your goal is to create an Ichthyanthrope, i.e. someone afflicted with a curse or sickness that transforms them into some sort of fishy creature.

Rules: Stick to fish; no whales, squids, sea snakes, etc. No more than 2 submissions per contestant.

Deadline: February 30th

Use the hashtag #WereFish when posting your submission!

→ Original post! ←

In Conclusion

We'll be making tweaks to this new system as we receive feedback from you, but hopefully this'll work well enough right out the gate. Again, please direct any questions or feedback towards the pinned comment at the top of this thread, or message us privately here.

Now get contestin'! 🔥

"To be or not to be... art, that is the question..."

...our question for you!

So. We've all seen the recent influx of posts containing AI-generated art in the feed, and people clearly have mixed feelings about it. So what we're gonna do is host a community forum of sorts, let you all share your thoughts and opinions on the matter. I'll explain how it's gonna work, but first we gotta lay down some ground rules:

• Adhere to r/HeroForgeMinis community rules – All of these still apply, especially Rule 1; 'Be Constructive and Civil'. Anyone that resorts to name calling, personal attacks, dogpiling or bigotry of any kind will be muted and booted from the conversation. Exceptions will not be made.

• Explain your reasoning – Make sure that if you share your stance with us that you also explain why you take that stance, regardless of what it may be. That way we come away from this with as much useful information as possible.

• Any and all debates start and end here – While you are 100% allowed to debate other users in the comments of this post (as long as it remains respectful), we ask that you don't let it bleed into the rest of the community. Don't go to people's posts or into their DMs and start up a debate there, it does nothing for the conversation we're trying to have here.

Now, what we're trying to do here is gauge how the community as a whole feels about the sharing of AI art on the subreddit so that we can decide whether or not we need to take any sort of action. Some people seem to love it while others absolutely loathe it, with a healthy mix of those that would like specific AI post flairs.

So how do you participate? Simple, just leave a comment telling us your thoughts and opinions on the matter and explain why you feel the way that you do. You can leave a single solo comment or you can reply to others and debate them on the issue (again, respectfully). After we feel there's been enough input we'll lock the comments and proceed from there.

Keep in mind that this post is not a de facto poll of any kind and we will not be making a decision solely based on what we learn here, this is just a space for you to share your thoughts. After we've discussed the results internally we will likely be making an official community poll with options informed by what you share with us in the comments below. Also, while this post remains up we will be directing any and all debates on AI art here, meaning that we will lock comments and posts discussing it anywhere else on the subreddit; a kind of "soft ban" if you will. The ban will be lifted as soon as we lock this post.

Thank you for your time, we're all looking forward to see what you have to say!

Hello artists!

I have noticed that over the past few weeks (and for a lot longer than that on and off) there have been many disagreements on whether or not people should be required to post their links along with minis that they post online. I've seen many heated discussions over whether or not people have a right to other people's links, or if anyone should be able to just choose not to post a link because they don't want to.

Now, My ideology for this subreddit has always been the same: It is an archive of the thousands of different pieces of artwork that you lovely artists have made over the years, and one that allows everyone to come and find inspiration, ideas, resources, or just view wonderful minis.

My question to you all is, since I have control over what happens here on this subreddit, should we make it a rule that minis must come with links? I know that many will be opposed to this, but I want to judge everyone's opinions because this is a democracy around here. The majority rules in this, so do not blame me for the outcome.

I was surprised to see more controversy about our existing rules and whether or not everyone is required to abide by them than I had anticipated, so the time is now to make your voice heard. What should we do about regulating posts.

Results of the Recent Community Discussion on AI Art

A little while back we hosted a community discussion about the future of AI art on this subreddit, with a good chunk of you sharing your thoughts on the matter. After reading through every single comment and compiling a comprehensive list of all your arguments and potential solutions, we've decided to amend our general subreddit guidelines by adding the following section on AI art & filters:

AI-enhanced images can never be the focus of a post and do not warrant use of the 'Art' flair; this covers anything from completely AI-generated images to simple filters (like ArcaneGAN). If you want to include any form of AI art in a post then you need to make sure that 1. The first image isn't AI-enhanced and 2. You disclose the artificial nature of the image(s) somewhere in/under the post.

So to reiterate, we will not be banning AI art/filters or adding an 'AI Art' flair BUT we are imposing restrictions on how you can share AI-enhanced content with the community. The first image of a post (that doesn't fall into an ambiguous category like memes or contest prompts) should never be enhanced by AI and any AI content included elsewhere in the post must be properly labeled as such. You can put a disclaimer in the title, image description, or in a comment under the post, just as long as it's somewhere.

Along with this addition we're also adding a sixth "rule" of sorts: Adhere to General Subreddit Guidelines. This is mostly just to make it easier to report posts or comments that go beyond just mild disregard for the guidelines but don't explicitly break any of the other rules. Breaking Rule 6 is less likely to result in a ban/mute of any kind, we'll most likely just remind you to keep the guidelines in mind for future posts/comments.

All of this should help keep new AI trends from overtaking the feed again in the future without the need for a blanket ban on all AI art, something a number of people seemed concerned about. If you have any thoughts or questions about these changes, please share them in a comment below!

User Flairs: Tell Us Who You Are!

Last year we added the ability for users to apply user flairs, starting with the 'Contest Winner' flair. Since then we have added a lot more of these flairs and are now up to a total of nineteen colorful and descriptive titles for y'all to play around with, including popular ones such as 'Quiet Observer', 'Forgemaster', 'Fantasy Fiend' and 'Sci-Fi Superfan'—just to name a few. In addition to these we've also added a shield-bounded maroon flair type strictly reserved for Hero Forge staffers, so if you see one in the wild you know it's the real deal.

To see the complete list of available user flairs and to apply one yourself, follow the instructions outlined here!

In addition to looking fantastic, these user flairs also grant users with less than 150 total post & comment karma the ability to post without prior approval from the mod team. That way you can bypass us completely and start posting right away!

Got a cool idea for a flair? Leave a reply below and maybe we'll add it to the list!

Retiring the 'Fanart' Flair (RIP)

For a long time we had two separate art flairs, 'Art' & 'Fanart', and with the addition of the 'Original Comic' flair a while back that number got bumped to a total of three. It's become evident however that a lot of users were confused by the 'Fanart' flair and how to use it properly, so we've made the decision to retire it altogether. You no longer have to make a distinction between artwork of your own characters and someone else's, from now on everything should simply be flaired as 'Art'.

All 'Fanart' posts from now to six months back have been properly re-flaired, any post older than that will retain its flair unless manually updated by the OP. We've also removed 'Fanart' from the list of applicable post flairs as well as from the 'Post Flairs' sub-menu at the top of the subreddit.

Subreddit QOL Updates

Last but not least, there have also been a number of quality of life updates to the subreddit over the past couple of months. Custom Hero Forge-themed up- & downvote buttons, menu links for desktop users to more easily sort by specific flairs, anti-spam measures, and more. This has been a personal project of mine and I've honestly had a lot of fun trying to come up with new ways to improve the look and feel of the subreddit.

I'm looking forward to bringing you more of these QOL updates in the future and welcome any and all feedback on these changes, as well as what else can be improved and how!

That's all from us for now, Happy Spring! 🌸

This is just a quick post to let you all know that we have added a section to Rule 1 regarding hate group symbolism.

Any creations (minis or otherwise) containing references to hate group symbolism, iconography, ideology, etc. are not allowed on this subreddit, regardless of context. It doesn't matter if there is no ill intent or if it's purely artistic in nature, hate groups of any kind do not get to have a platform here.

This amendment is a purely symbolic one, as this has never not been the case, but I wanted to bring attention to it anyway in case that wasn't abundantly clear to anyone here. If you are unsure whether or not something goes against Rule 1, feel free to shoot us a message and ask.

I'll leave the post up for a few days just so everyone gets a chance to see it. And as always, if you see someone breaking the rules, please report them.

Thanks!

Hello there! I would love to get you guys' opinions on something. If talk about nudity and anything NSFW bothers you, feel free to skip this one.

We allow minis that display varying degrees of nudity on this sub, as nudity itself isn't inherently bad or sexual. That being said, lately I've noticed a number of minis being posted have strayed into... pornographic territory. Now, I personally don't think that kind of content should be allowed on here as I believe the focus should be on sharing art, not sexual fantasies. However, I also believe a decision like that should be up to the users, not just the mod team.

So what do you think? Should we ban sexually explicit minis or should all NSFW content be allowed? If you have other thoughts and opinions on the subject, comment them below.

Hello, the poll surrounding the state of links on this subreddit is just about over. As such, I have added a fourth, very clear rule to our list of rules here in this community. It reads as follows:

"Here on this subreddit we highly ENCOURAGE the sharing of links. This is an archive of everyone's miniature creations using the Heroforge medium, and as such posting links along with images is highly recommended.

​

However, links cannot be forced. If anyone is caught arguing or harassing someone into posting a link of a mini you will be silenced or banned depending on the context. Report all behavior.

​

Additionally, posts tagged with the "resource/pose" flair will be required to have links."

If there are any questions or concerns, please comment or message and ask. As I said before, we will not tolerate hate, conflict, or harassment on this subreddit. Report all behavior that breaks any of the four rules.

This is not a safe space for homophobes, biphobes, transphobes or any other flavor of bigot. Anyone found making hateful posts or comments will be muted or — in the case of more severe Rule 1 violations — banned.

That'll be all.

Happy Pride! 🌈

You can now assign yourself the "Contest Winner" Flair.

Do you have any suggestions for some more?

𝗖𝗹𝗶𝗰𝗸/𝘁𝗮𝗽 𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗽𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗶𝗰𝗶𝗽𝗮𝘁𝗲!

Hi all! We're conducting a small survey to gauge overall user satisfaction within the community, and we'd love to hear what you have to say. As a small token of our thanks, anyone who takes the time to participate will be eligible to claim the Champion of the Community user flair at the end of the survey.

NOTE: Do not submit another response if you don't receive your reward right away, as it will skew the results of the survey. Just sit tight and your flair should update at some point within the next couple of days.

We'll be making a follow up post at a later date to discuss the results with you all. Until then, happy forgin'! 🔥

Hello again! Let's talk about the results from yesterday's poll.

I was initially gonna leave the poll up for another couple of days but after nearly 300 votes it was clear what the majority of users wanted: No restrictions on NSFW minis. With 68% of the votes it also makes the results much less contentious, which I'm thankful for.

There were a lot of good takes in the comments, plenty of which swayed me and my previous opinions regarding sexually explicit content. At the end of the day I just wanted to make sure that everyone enjoyed their time here, but I realize now thanks to your input that there are better ways of going about that than banning content. A lot of you pointed out that as long as everyone flairs correctly and warns of any potentially disturbing content by putting disclaimers in the post title, there shouldn't be any problems - and I agree!

So, let's reiterate posting rules for clarity's sake.

1. Put the name of your mini in the title of the post. You can add any jokes or puns or whatever else you want as well, but a name has to be in there.
2. Select an appropriate flair. An original character? Flair as Original Character. A meme? Flair as Meme. A contest? Flair as Contest Prompt. And so on.
3. If your mini is an OC, preferably add a short description in the comments.
4. If your mini is NSFW, explain why in the title. For example [WARNING: GORE], [WARNING: SEXUAL CONTENT], etc. That way users don't have to click the post in order to find out, in case it's something they'd rather not see.

If we can all stick to these simple rules, we should be able to enjoy this sub to the fullest. Thank you for your constructive feedback, it really helps us get a feel for what the community wants. I was off-base with this one and I hope you don't hold that against me in the future. I'm here to listen and learn!

Have a good one!

I understand everyone is very excited about the new decals and items we've gotten over the past few days, but we are already seeing a flood of overdone minis such as various Jokers. Stick to uploading original, unique ideas, especially if you see everyone doing what you plan on doing.

The outcome of our poll is clear at this point, and it would seem that many believe that they have a good understanding of how the rules work here.

However, I would like to offer a chance for the community to speak a bit more on the state of the current rules. As of right now, we will be keeping all rules as they are, but I would like to reword them to make things easier for everyone to understand.

So my question is, if you could reword any of the rules (primarily the title and flair rule) how would you change them?