The forums is supposed to the the place where rank does not matter, everyone just comes together in the community. While I dont mind the idea, I also don't find it necessary.
Sorry but I'm siding with the non-supporters As much as it would look nice, it's easier said than done and being active on the forums gets you your own different type of rank (member, active member etc.) but a cool idea nonetheless :p
This has been suggested a few times and I don't think it's even possible to set it up automatically, I'll have to add the ranks manually which I don't fancy doing at all if I'm honest. We were thinking of adding $5 monthly VIP forum rank that comes with an awesome VIP sparkly PIP with extra forum permissions + VIP section and it's all auto but we're not 100% sure if we do want to add VIP rank to the forum. TL;DR: No.
This was set up by another server called mcsg. If you hit up their forums, they have a system where they type in their user names when registering or changing names and their donor ranks reflect on forums. Former mods and Yotubers and such also get the "Vip" rank. Just sayin, it's possible to do it automatically. But I understand if you just don't fancy the idea.
You can set it up automatically, but it is complicated, as you need to use MYSQL databases and it takes a very long time. So, I understand why you said no.
If it were to be added, and done manually. Could you not give moderators permissions to do this, or would that not work?