How often have you had to sit around while someone's checking rules. I cause this to happen every time we play since we only recently started and we actually have the rule books

And it's for this reason I insist that my players pretty much memorize or bookmark everything their characters can do. Even better if you try to plan ahead and look up rules for things when you don't immediately need to give all of your attention... like when you split the party and the other group is the focus.

Either way... learning the rules is a major help. Learning where to go to immediately find everything in the books that you need is also a help.

For example:
Rules for draugr in VtR? Night Horrors the Wicked Dead has a section on it, and it's also the additional systems for the Gangrel Clanbook.

I can do a lot more than just those... but that's the gist... it's also why I like PDF rulebooks, even though I miss the feel of flipping through books.

How often does looking up the rules for something to figure out if you can use it for something interesting right now NOT happen?

Pretty constant feature of role-playing games in my experience. Even simple versus complex systems doesn't seem to change that; its just the former are looking to make sure nothing was written about the situation at hand while the latter is tracking down the official rules that you know exist... somewhere!

Knowing the rules better helps but not by a huge margin; in most systems that just means you know of more stuff you need to look up! XD

This happens more with players trying to figure out what they could do, or one of the divine casters wants to go spend half an hour selecting a different set of spells because the terrain changed. Although occasionally it's... I use this ability!.... Now I need to go look up what it does. This aggravates me because I rarely have to even look at my sheet unless we're in a strange situation or we're using skill checks I don't normally use with a character, and even then it's usually a quick reference.

How often has this happened: "I have a brilliant idea that will end this fight... No, wait that won't work... What about... Give me a minute to consult my books." It has happened to all of us at one point or another and occasionally this checking has resulted in something truly epic as we will no doubt see in the pages to come.

It wasn't nearly as epic as someone would imagine, but it saved the group's bacon. The DM had decided to drop two sambling mounds and several fish-men on our heads before we managed to rest. In an inn. In a town with heavy guard. Not only that but he started to have all the rolls he didn't have as a player, with several critical rolls.

The party is exhausted, the ninja rat is nearly dead, the aasimar paladin has been traped and is getting a ton of damage, the rogue isn't trapped but is on the verge of death, the druid is running out of spells, and my poor elven magus is down to her cantrips... When I decide to check how you can use the magus "arcana points" and see that they can be used to recover spells. Cue several barrages of magic missiles from the very pissed off elf. It lowered the mound's life enough for the paladin to kill the damned thing, and then we proceded to go and rescue the rest of the team.

Not a bad thing, seeing as it looked like a TPK...

Meh, I prefer the 2006 series.

Do you mean the 2003 series that lasted until 2008 or so?

That or Raxon specifically prefers Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Fast Forward: it is kind of confusing since that series that began in 2003 kept renaming and trying to reinvent itself in the quest for more ratings.

I've enjoyed all the series so far except for Next Mutation, which I barely saw any of and don't plan to seek out. I haven't seen the original cartoon or movies in quite some time, never read much of the comics (just some of the Archie stuff as TMNT was winding down). I guess I haven't re-watched the 2003 series recently either, it just isn't as far removed. I watch what I can of the Nickelodeon series. If I had to choose I... ya know, I don't know what I'd go with; I remember loving the 2003 series but having a lot of cringe inducing moments, especially the longer it ran. What little I've seen of the earlier cartoon tells me I might be in for a lot more of the same (I remember caring less and less for it as it too kept trying to reinvent itself). I should probably wait until the Nickelodeon run is done and has had some time to age to see if what I love about it remains good and if what irritates me ages for the best or the worst.

My bad. I meant 2003. The seasons after fast forward were the weakest, and had conspicuously smaller animation budgets.

my Enjoyment of TMNT series varies directly with the number of times April has been Hypnotized by the villians.

the best way i have found to learn where the rules are, and memorize the more commonly used ones is to making lots of different characters in any system.

i usually try to avoid that by having my PCs write down anything magical or upgraded (or spells) on separate cue cards or small notebooks. as for the rules, my DM screen has a bunch of them already on it, so i dont have to look far for it. anything that really needs looking into, then we use the books, but for the most part, my system works and we dont use the books unless the PCs level up or are looking for new "toys" to kill enemies with.

(sorry for not comenting on youtube)
I have to say that the Let's Play of Life is Strange fits you a lot better then the secret of Monkey Island. I like your style of literary trying to see/hear everything. It fits the game so well!
I really enjoy watching you play this, more then I did with monkey island. And, more importantly, I enjoy it more then the let's play I watched of it earlier.
I think it's because you take your time for it and retrace your steps more, instead of "Oh well, I chose this, let's go further!". Or maybe all the backgroun information I missed the first time.
Anyway, I enjoy it!
When you're done, can please make a let's play of chapter 2 too?

Thanks! I enjoy reading your comments regardless of where it's posted. Maybe I should do more Let's Plays of episodic-based games from now on. ^_^

Anyways, I do plan on making a Let's Play of chapter 2 as well. In fact, I've been avoiding watching any Let's Plays of that chapter so that I can make a blind playthrough of it. :p

A little bit late but... thanks!
Glad to hear that! Can't wait!

Since there's more or less always some thing going on with tmnt at least every five years, that sentence always work.

aah, checking the rules. whn you're not sure if you can pull out what you're trying.
or when you want to see if there's no way to make it easier.
or when you just plain desperately want to find that no, your character is'nt doomed and there still is one option you are forgetting.