Inspired by your question, I've put a thread up which kind of gives the most basic details of how to and what to: maybe that will help too. It is a perfectly viable choice, and if you have enough worms and crabs and snails breaking down the little fishfood that falls in, the coral has no trouble growing, and growing, once it gets settled, quite fast, as in daily or near-daily changes. Main thing is start your pieces low in the tank to be sure they get adjusted to your lights slowly, bring them up to the point where (as you learn) that kind is happiest, and then glue them down, because corals are sensitive to little shocks and wobbles in the current. They like to be stable. Exception: plate---plate is a stony that actually walks across the sandbed and should never be glued---but in general it's also a more advanced coral---wait on that one.
Best stonies for beginners---lps like hammer, frog, acans, candy cane.
Best softies: zoas, palys (wear gloves: they are toxic, and don't frag ANY coral without eye protection---this is very serious: do not do it!), mushrooms, xenia.
If you are a novice with corals, don't in general start with sps---these are the colored sticks: leave those to the guys who've been doing reefs for a couple of years.
