I like the mockup you've got going on. Color scheme works. Blue is a great color to work with. You should definitely consider running things how they do at forumpromotion.net. It seems to have been pretty successful for them.

Add more to the concept work so I can critique it further.

PS. the AdsTower links you got reminded me of my old site TheWebTower.

Thanks Aaron. I am actually a long time part of that forum, and currently still am. And I never realized that WebTower was yours!

By the way, update:
s14.postimg.org/mkm73vb3j/image.png

Yup! I launched it in 2009 and it was eventually acquired by Stijl.com.

I'm diggin' the progress! Not sure how I feel about the colons after 'Topics', 'Posts' and 'Last Post' but other than that it looks good.

What forum system do you plan on using?

I think that was more habitual grammar on my part than actuality. I removed them later on, when I realized what I did.

phpBB. Only problem is I am so used to the proboards system that I am not familiar with web hosting, cpanel, and most importantly, styling. I know a guy who offered to do the styling for me to match the theme identically for $60, which isn't bad, I guess. Isn't ideal though.

I wish I had the skills needed to actually layout my designs. It is on my todo list.