bbPress does not create the .htaccess file. You have to manually create it with a text editor either on the server, on locally, then upload it. The file can contain one of two things:
1. Options +MultiViews
or
2. visit http://website.com/dir/bb-admin/rewrite-rules.php
That script will generate the rules you need to put in your .htaccess file. Use this if the first option does not work.
If you cannot get permalinks working, just change the mod_rewrite line to false in your config, so you can at least use your forum until you get permalinks working.
$bb->mod_rewrite = false;
*edited* Thank you. That worked, but I still need help with figuring out why there is no comment form after clicking the reply button.
Do you have a link to your forum to see this problem in action? Maybe it’s just cached information in the browser that is still around even though you’ve made changes.
looks like i had a bad install. sorry for the panic. 
t3ch33
@t3ch33
16 years, 2 months ago
When clicking the reply button, the ‘reply’ string appears in the url, but the comment form does not appear.
When I enable pretty urls, the urls do not work. This is because I don’t have a .htaccess file, though. Why don’t I have one? I thought that bbPress creates it, like WP does.