USCF membership

I was wondering what you guys think would be an apporpiate chess.com rating before i go to a tournement. I would rather not go to a touneyment and get stomped. i was wondering what rating should i achieve on chess.com befor ei go to an acually real life tounrment.1200,1400,1500? etc

That is a very personal question. Just go when you feel like competing.

OTB play is a lot different than playing online. If you don't mind losing, then just play. Otherwise, try to find out the ratings of the most common players in the events you might go to. If there are rating sections, that would make it easier.

Also, it depends on which chess.com rating you mean and what time control(s) you would be looking at playing OTB. My chess.com blitz is abot 400 points lower than my OTB rating (I suck at blitz -- mostly time problems). My Live Standard is within 100 points (but not with very many games).

Playing OTB is generally a greater challenge that will put your motivation to a test: this is my experience as a 1520 FIDE-rated player:

- it is expensive, since you have to pay for official membership in a federation, pay the entry fee, and if not organized next door you must pay for travel and accomodation as well.

- it tends to be more difficult; your FIDE rating is mostly under most other ratings you may have over the internet (USCF rating may be more in the range of the chess.com ratings). Most tournaments are long-time controls, that mean that you must be much more patient and the quality of your opponent's moves is much higher than in a typical standard game over the internet. If you make a mistake at the beginning of the game, you may have to stare at your disaster for several hours. It is very likely to happen since your opponents will have his/her openings prepared and I encountered a LOT of vicious opening traps.

- games are usually  long, from 2 to 6 hours, therefore every defeat makes you feel you have lost a lot. You can eventually turn this upside-down and learn a lot from the mistake, however what would take a few minutes to learn on chess.com takes you a half a day in an OTB tournament.