The forums I have sifted through have provided some crazy-intense explanations of how to calculate for the size of a capacitor used with a v-reg, but I'm hoping someone can spell it all out in a much clearer fashion so I can grasp the concepts moving forward.
Without explaining what you don't understand, this thread is probably going to end up in the same direction.
Whenever current is drawn from a regulator, the voltage will start to drop. There is a certain amount of time it takes before the regulator notices and increases voltage to compensate. This is known as ripple. The amount of ripple will be larger if more current is drawn from the regulator. To compensate, a capacitor provides a temporary bank of energy. This helps keep the voltage stable resulting in less ripple.
So when picking values of capacitors you need to know the maximum amount of current load and expected amount of ripple. Principle applies to both the input and output side. The difference is that the voltage ripple will be different.
Keep in mind most designs will calculate the minimum caps need and then select something larger.