My image ranking system is done by placing an image tag after the user's title in the User Title section of the control panel. Looking in ubb_lib_posting, user_status is the following:
[code][/code]... so I'm pretty sure I will be using $user_profile[7], since [8] tells you whether or not the member is a mod, admin, or member.
Even if other people don't use an image/avatar system like I am, it'll still be helpful as $user_profile[7] will display the member's text status on the main forum page.
Thanks for the effort, Prime!