What is Castaway?
Castaway is a small TF2 server community. If you visit the main website at castaway.tf it should be self explanatory.
Why are there rules here?
If you came to this forum and are distraught at the fact that there are rules, know that the rules are mostly loose and general and will not be enforced very hard. They exist to guide people not to post the wrong things rather than moderate every individual post, which is not something I want to do or have time for. As long as you exercise common sense, and are not trolling or intentionally trying to get yourself banned, you are most likely already following the rules.
Site Usage
How do I ___?
Check the forum software's autogenerated Site FAQ to see if your question is answered there first.
How do I post images?
You can embed images in posts using direct links to image files, or by uploading files directly. My personal recommendation would be to use an external site, such as https://imgchest.com as it is both free and very fast. Any site will work really though I would advise against catbox as it is generally slow for accessing files and your images may get stuck loading. As I am not a media provider and the drive space for the forum server is limited, I cannot host everything on this site, which is why external sites would be preferred. There is a 3 attachment limit, but there is no limit to the number of external image links you can have in a post, which is why it works better.
Why do I need to log in with steam to register?
This forum is for TF2 game servers. If you play on the servers, you have a steam account. It's easy to have everyone log in that way to prevent spam accounts from being created, on top of automatically linking your account to your steam profile. While you do still need to create a username and password necessarily, you can always log in with steam. In this way, it becomes a more enhanced version of Steam Discussions.
Why do I need to create a username and password?
Usernames are unique, which means users should pick their own usernames on signup. However in order to change your username after signup, you need to enter a password. While I can circumvent the forum softwares need for an email by generating a dummy one, I can't generate a dummy password for you. Therefore in order to allow users to change usernames we need them to also create passwords. It also serves as a faster way of signing in if you so choose, as signing into steam on browser often requires 2fa while this does not.
How do I reset my password?
I don't have anything set up for this right now. My best advice is to write it down somewhere. You can always sign in with steam if you lose access to your password. In the future some form of password reset functionality may be added.
Site Information
What are account ranks?
There are two types of account ranks. One based on your join date to the community, the other based on your number of posts on the forum. Your join date gives you a badge, similar to the 119th update badges in TF2. Your post rank is listed underneath (and is pirate themed). You will see them on your profile and your posts.
Which account ranks are there?
Join date is calculated as the earliest time of either your first time joining the steam group, or your first time being seen in a SourceTV demo. Since demos were not recorded prior to December 2024, all join dates before that use the steam group value. Join date rank cutoff timestamps:
Primeval Warrior: Any date prior to July 4th, 2024 @ 6:22:30pm UTC (Second Gabber video advertising Castaway)
Grizzled Veteran: Between Primeval and October 10, 2024 @ 11:57:00pm UTC (Date of when first reverts servers went online)
Soldier of Fortune: Between Grizzled and June 11, 2025 @ 9:13:43pm UTC (Castaway's first birthday)
Mercenary: Any time after Castaway's first birthday
Can you give me a different rank?
No.
Oh, they never lie. They dissemble, evade, prevaricate, confound, confuse, distract, obscure, subtly misrepresent and willfully misunderstand with what often appears to be a positively gleeful relish and are generally perfectly capable of contriving to give one an utterly unambiguous impression of their future course of action while in fact intending to do exactly the opposite, but they never lie. Perish the thought.
