When to check-raise?

[DrGonzo]

Newbie question I guess, but I would really like to know what the best spots are for making a check-raise.

When I played limit holdem a long time ago, I did a substantial amount of check-raising. After switching to NL, I hardly ever check-raise. According to what I read in books and on the forum, you should check-raise much less when you are playing NL and need to build the pot, so I guess that is in order. There should be some occasions when a check-raise is effective though, shouldn't there?

When flopping a really strong hand (set), the consensus seems to be to lead at the pot instead of check-raising. When running a bluff at the pot, you don't want to check-raise, since that jeopardizes a lot of chips. Check-raising with a mediocre hand does not make sense to me since you don't want to risk building a big pot and you don't want weaker hands to fold.

Still, it feels like I'm missing a great weapon in the arsenal when I almost never check-raise. I think the only place I do sometimes check-raise is when I river a big hand that is somewhat concealed. Please tell me what you think are good spots for check-rasing and against what types of opponents.

Thank you