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Events

Creating Your First Event

Fill out the event form, publish, and your club has its first event on the calendar — about 5 minutes from blank slate to published. Sets you up to record attendance next.

Events are the heartbeat of your club — practices, tournaments, lessons, whatever your schedule looks like. Once an event exists, you can publish it for members to RSVP, and later record attendance against it. This guide gets your first event published.

Before you start

Have these ready:

  • A name for the event (“Saturday Open Practice” works fine)
  • A date and start time
  • A location, or a note that it’s online

New clubs start with two seeded event types — Meetup for practices and casual play, Tournament for rated or competitive events. Running something different? A workshop, a study group, a junior camp — jump to Customizing event types first to add the type your event needs, then come back here.

The Events list page with no events yet and an empty state message.
A fresh club's Events page. The first event you create will appear here.

Step 1: Fill out the create event form

Head to Events → New Event (or the quick action on the dashboard). The form is organized into sections.

The full create event form filled out showing all sections: Basic Information, Date and Time, Recurrence, Registration and Attendance, and Event Settings.
The full create event form. Each section is covered below.

Basic Information — Give the event a name and pick a type from the dropdown. Meetup is selected by default — use it for practices, lessons, casual play, and anything informal. Tournament is for rated or competitive events. Add an optional description, then choose the location format. The Location toggle is In Person or Online; choosing In Person reveals a text field for the venue name or address.

Date and Time — Pick a date, then a start time. The end time auto-fills to 90 minutes after start — adjust it if your event runs longer or shorter. The timezone defaults to your club’s setting. For events that span multiple days (tournaments, camps), tick Multi-day event to reveal paired Starts and Ends rows so you can set separate end-date and end-time.

The Date and Time section in multi-day mode showing two paired rows labelled Starts and Ends, each with a date field and a time field, with the Multi-day event checkbox checked.
Multi-day expanded: paired Starts and Ends rows appear when you tick the checkbox.

Recurrence — If you’re on the Pawn plan, this section shows a disabled “Make this a recurring event” checkbox.

Registration & Attendance — Two independent controls here.

Participation Type sets how members respond to the event:

  • No participation tracking — the event is visible but there are no RSVP or registration buttons.
  • RSVP — members see Yes / Maybe / No buttons on the event detail page. Best for practices and casual events.
  • Registration — a fuller registration flow, suited for tournaments or events with limited spots.

Enable attendance tracking is a separate checkbox. When checked, an Attendance Deadline date field appears. Enabling this is what surfaces per-member Present / Absent / Late / Excused controls on the event detail page — which is exactly what the Recording Attendance guide covers next.

Event Settings — A Public event checkbox and a Status dropdown (Draft / Published / Cancelled). Status defaults to Draft.

Step 2: Publish

Status is how you publish. Change the dropdown from Draft to Published, then click Create Event. Only published events are visible to members — the helper text under the field says exactly that.

You can always come back from the event detail page to edit the status, the description, or anything else. Nothing is permanent at creation time.

What members will see

Once published, members land on the event detail page when they tap or click the event.

The event detail page for 'Saturday Open Practice' showing the title, type badge, status badge, summary cards (Date & Time, Location & Access, Registration, Attendance), the description, and the RSVP section with Yes/Maybe/No buttons.
The event detail page. RSVP buttons appear at the bottom; the per-member attendance section sits below that (covered next, in Recording Attendance).

The page shows the event name, its type badge (color-coded), and status badge at the top, followed by summary cards for date/time and location. If RSVP is enabled, members see Yes / Maybe / No buttons with a running tally. The attendance section at the bottom — with per-member Present / Absent / Late / Excused controls — is covered step by step in the Recording Attendance guide.

Find it again later

Head to Events any time to see your list.

The Events list showing 'Saturday Open Practice' with its blue Meetup badge and Published status.
Your published event in the list. The Type and Status filters at the top let you narrow down as your calendar grows.

The Type and Status filters at the top of the list let you find specific events quickly. The status badge (“Published”, “Draft”) is visible inline so you don’t have to open each event to know what members can see.

Customizing event types

The two seeded types (Meetup, Tournament) cover most clubs. If they don’t fit yours — say you’d rather call it “Practice” and “Rated Game”, or you want separate “Lesson” and “Workshop” types — open Settings → Event Types.

The Event Types settings page listing Meetup (blue) and Tournament (red), both marked as System.
The two seeded types. Rename them with Edit, or add more with Add Event Type.

Click Edit on a row to rename it, or Add Event Type for a new one. The new-type form has four fields:

  • Label — the display name your members see (e.g. “Lesson”)
  • Name — an internal identifier in lowercase with underscores. Rook fills this in as you type the label; adjust it if needed.
  • Color — choose from Blue, Green, Red, Orange, Purple, Yellow, Gray, or Cyan. This colors the badge on the event detail page and in the events list.
  • Description — optional, for your own reference.
The Add Event Type form filled out with Label and Name fields and a Color dropdown.
Adding a third event type. The Name field defaults to the Label lowercased — you usually won't need to change it.

What’s next

With an event published, the natural next step is recording who showed up:

If you haven’t built your roster yet, start there first:

If you get stuck, the FAQ has answers to the most common questions, and you can always email support@rookready.com.

Updated May 12, 2026