Question: In a recent (otherwise quite solid) edit of [“Will changing an artifact sword to another weapon type impact game balance much?”](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/q/30616/4563), @okeefe changed the British spelling “artefact” to the American spelling “artifact.”

Searching our meta, I see no rule regarding whether a particular spelling is preferred, or whether someone editing a question *anyway* can or should change from one spelling to another.

Answer: 
You might be overthinking it. This might not be a case of which English is The Correct English.

D&D 4e has a thing called artifacts. I live in Australia, where we spell it "artefacts", but nevertheless, in the context of D&D 4e I will happily and consistently call them artifacts. They consistently call it that, and as far as I'm aware, they have no instances of calling them "artefacts".

It would probably be weird if some of the books called them "artefacts", just like it'd be weird if some of the books said "magick" instead of "magic." I see it as being a convention they have with a defined spelling, so I go with it.

We should probably ask okeefe though. Right?
Personal feeling: the initial spelling in such cases should be left alone, even if you are already editing the question or answer for other reasons.

And even if we decide that we should standardize on a single spelling, seems to me that this would not be a large enough change on its own to justify making the edit in the first place, if you were not editing it anyway.