BuddyPress.org

@dromicus
Not be be short with you but I don’t care to much for typing long replies anymore but if you go to https://bbpress.org/ and read the documentation you should be able to answer most of your own questions. There are also plenty of plugins to extend bbPress so you can explore that option as well if needed. Good luck!

@dromicus
BuddyPress is for the social networking components and does not provide forums without an additional plugin. You will need bbPress which is for forums and it does integrate with BuddyPress.