Account Verification
Once you've registered, you can post immediately, even before confirming your email.

Under certain circumstances, new accounts will need to be verified by an admin. When this is the case, all new posts before admin verification will be screened by moderators and you won't be able to make new threads. When exactly we fully verify is based on the posts you make and kiiiiinda subjective, but a good bet is to introduce yourself in the intro thread.
Account registration does not currently require admin activation.

Which Forum Does My Thread Go In!??!!?

• Roleplays: For games with few to no "crunchy" rules governing the outcome of actions, focused primarily on character interaction.
  
• Hybrid games: For games that are rules-heavy (like Mafia, but not necessarily actually Mafia), but still involve a strong roleplaying element.
  • Murdergames are that specific subset of hybrid games that are literally "Mafia plus roleplay".
    
• OOC threads: For threads dedicated to discussing one of the above without having to disrupt the game by having the discussion in the game thread.
  • Signups are that subset of OOC threads which literally just take people signing up for games and don't really involve discussion. It is a GM's choice as to whether they want their signup and discussion threads merged or separate.
    
• Forum games: The kind of stuff one typically expects to find in a subject-specific forum's "grudging obligatory forum games section" -- non-roleplay games that typically have a single central rule, like "comment on the above signature" or "what does the magical vending machine return based on the above poster's input".
  • Mafia games: For games that are Mafia, or Mafia-like, based primarily on the idea of a public Day phase where an uninformed Town chooses a player to eliminate and a secret Night phase where an informed Mafia chooses an innocent to kill.
    
• Misc: For threads that have nothing to do with any of the above.
  • Media Discussion is, well, about discussing media -- video games, TV shows, things like that.
    
  • Alive Blogs is for liveblogging - Let's Play, reactions, things like that.
    
  • The Backroom is only visible to registered users, making it more suitable for slightly sensitive subjects that we might not want the whole universe to be looking at willy-nilly. (Stuff that's really sensitive might be better not discussed on TC in the first place!)
    

Useful Features

• Thread Subscriptions: At the bottom of every thread, there's a "Subscribe to this thread" link. Clicking that (and choosing a subscription type) adds it to your subscriptions list, which you can see in your User Control Panel. Additionally, in your options, you can set a "Default Thread Subscription Mode" to be applied to every thread you post in. These make it easy to keep up with threads that are important to you.
  
• Forum Portal: At the top of every page is a "Portal" link. This takes you to a page showing various useful information like newly-posted threads and stuff.
  
• Source Editor: You can switch between the source and WYSIWYG editors by clicking the little button in the toolbar. But also, in your options, there's a little checkbox saying "Put the editor in source mode by default". To ensure your formatting is reliable, check that box and use MyCode to format your posts.
  
• Themes: In your options, and also at the bottom of every page, you can find a theme selection dropdown.
  • "Light Cube" is the default theme.
    
  • "Dark Cube" is dark mode.
    
  • "hat theme!!!!" is a fun little experiment by @awe921. It's green!
    
  • "Starry Blues", also by awe, is starry and also blue, which is rad.
    
  • "Dusty Fanclub Official" lets you experience the wonder that is @Kennifer's beloved purrbaby.
    
  • "Jupiter Fanclub Official" allows you to appreciate @Whistle's grumpy old kitty. (When your theme suddenly changed on April Fool's Day 2022, this is what it changed to.)
    
  • "Patchy Fanclub Official" allows you to observe our adorable little kittycat. (April Fool's Day 2024)
    
• All themes also have a "narrow" subtheme that restricts the page to its minimum width, in case viewing on a widescreen monitor is making your eyes hurt.
  
• Help documents: For useful info about this board, including but not limited to secret markup types >:D
  

The User Control Panel has a lot of other useful features -- seriously, go play around with it for a bit! It's fun!