bbPress.org

when “hidden” the whole forum containing non subscribed topics is hidden which also takes the possibility to subscribe to a topic at all.

hidden forums are only accessible to Admins and Mods.

when “private” it removes the reply form if a user is not subscribed (for admins, too).
replies of a topic are still viewable.

I will update my gist file to show the reply form to Admins/Mods so they do not have to subscribe.

The replies to a topic being viewable I am not really getting? In what circumstance do you want the replies to be hidden??