Forum search
What TornLife's research has established about Forum search, and the questions players asked about it.
What TornLife has verified
- Torn's forum search supports a filter syntax of the form by:Username (or by:ID) to restrict results to posts made by a specific player, and this can be combined with additional unquoted words, e.g. "by:Chedburn crimes" to search that user's posts for the word "crimes". (confirmed by Torn; Forum Search Terms, )
- A developer stated that all areas of Torn, including the top search bar, use the same underlying search system, which matches a search string anywhere within a name (not only as a prefix) — for example searching "Pence" finds a player named "MikePence" even though the name does not start with that string. (confirmed by Torn; User search sorting, )
- The same developer declined a player request to make the search tool show only names starting with the entered text, saying it would require an extra query mode (exact match first, then starts-with, then any-match) that would slow the search down, and concluded it was better left as-is. (confirmed by Torn; User search sorting, )
- Staff have directed players to use forum keyword search as a verification tool, e.g. telling a faction leader to search the forums for keywords "moonshine" or "crocozade" to confirm an item was consumed by a member, indicating keyword search across forum content is a normal, functioning method for finding specific posts. (confirmed by Torn; OC2 Not paying properly, )
- Patch list #422 (covering 17/02/2026–24/02/2026) added a sort option to the Advanced Search system allowing results to be ordered by name, level, age, last action, or random. (confirmed by Torn; Patch list #422 : Fallen badges, Advanced search sorting, New scenario, EOD cou…, )
- Staff confirmed that combining the by: author filter with a double-quoted phrase (e.g. by:Chedburn "crimes 2.0") produces an error ("Error: 550 No Reason Phrase") rather than valid results — this specific combination is broken/unsupported. (confirmed by Torn; Forum Search Terms, )
- A staff member explicitly stated that double quotes in forum search are not meant to produce exact-phrase matching, and that the set of acceptable search characters/syntax is documented on the wiki search page — implying quoted text is not treated as a literal exact-match query. (confirmed by Torn; Forum Search Terms, )
- Patch list #149 (07/07/19) improved the forum search tool and added new operators; patch list #151 (21/07/19) added a Forum Search history dropdown panel that saves the 5 most recent searches; patch list #153 (04/08/19) increased forum search results to 1,000 pages. (confirmed by Torn; Forum/Patch History, )
- The by:Username (or by:ID) author-filter syntax for forum search was introduced in patch list #115, dated 29/10/19, with the documented example "by: 1" or "by: Chedburn testing". (confirmed by Torn; Forum/Patch History, )
- The developer acknowledged in 2014 that forum searching had multiple issues, including a case where searching for the literal start-of-post text "When I am using" returned zero results even though a matching post clearly existed, indicating exact/leading-phrase matches were unreliable at that time. (confirmed by Torn; Forum searching, )
- Staff fixed a reported display glitch in forum search results (missing background styling/odd formatting on result rows tied to the new text editor) in 2019, confirming the search results page was actively maintained for rendering bugs separate from matching logic. (confirmed by Torn; Forum "Search" function gives janky results, )
Questions about Forum search
- Where is the forum thread about a player completing a full Maol armor set?
It's "I overpaid for the maol set so you dont have to," started by Akenomics in the Achievements board on 2025-11-02 (thread ID 16514047) .
Combat ·
- How can players search Torn's forums efficiently for specific posts, users, or keywords?
For keyword searches of posts, use the general forum search box and the by:Username (or by:ID) filter to restrict results to one player's posts, opti…