I find myself spending so much time setting up the permission masks when creating a forum.
Maybe IPS could make another area where you select default permission masks or some kind of preset.

And when creating a forum you just select a radiobox, and your default permission masks are loaded up on the check boxes.

I suggest you manage user permissions using different member groups (and secondary member groups), leaving the permission masks for different regions of board.

Thus, when creating a new forum, you'll need to edit only one permission mask (or add a new one specifically for that forum), and all the members in the member groups with that permission will get the permission automatically.

eyedam