Delays and Diversions

 The C&S stuff is still live. But I have some intrusions into my thinking and planning.

Club 1830

I may have become divorced from the "modern boardgame" movement but I still find time for a spot of 18xx (and some solo wargaming).

Club 1830 was already going when I decided to disconnect from other bg noise. It suits me better to have a handful of games to really dig into, than to be constantly sampling other potential delights. During lockdown we had a "support bubble" for a friend who would have not have survived Covid, had he caught it. In that little group I seized my chance to try and get a small group together to play 1830 a couple of times - at least until we all had wrapped our heads around the basic play and could finish a game in an afternoon. We've now got ten "known" games, all with at least a dozen plays, and a couple more awaiting their time.

I'm not of the opinion that 1830 is the King of Games. I don't think any game could claim that title. It just happened that we accidently formed an 18xx group and that I was happy to keep it when I stopped trying to keep up with other games. 

I prefer the 'nastier' titles to the 'gentler' ones. I like the interaction and I like that they're better at allowing a player back into the game (if they're not completely splatted, of course). 

We're not an especially fast group and we like to get a game finished in an afternoon. This filters out any games with a "box time" exceeding five hours. Three to four is preferable.

The games which have been getting the most attention this year have been 18GB and 1882. 

The former was new to us this year. I wasn't certain that I'd enjoy it as it looked to be more operational than financial. It turned out that the main focus was track laying - and luckily that proved to an interesting problem. Usually, track laying is the weakest part of my game - I'm too used to taking a short-term view there. Due the nature of the map, and the monetary incentives to join London to the north of Scotland, there is some keen competition to get stations in the OO and XX tiles which fill the Midlands or to elbow one's way onto Ken's Eastern Bypass.  

1882 has been a favourite since I first got it. We've just had four consecutive plays, each better than the previous. Between the short train roster and the very limited tile set it can be a brutal game. This set of games saw David begin to play a lot more aggressively than usual (starting a second company in SR2 in the last game) and me putting more thinking into my track game.

It will, sadly, get put aside for a few meetings as we learn 1822:PNW. When we were playing 1822:MRS I got slaughtered every time but I'm that this time round the 1822 gameplay will click with me.

The Three Artists referring to earlier material

Vocations and Starting Skills.

Vocations and Starting Skills

yes - this is getting a lot edits as I go.

Thoughts and Archaeology

Back in 1st edition, C&S followed D&D in being heavily Class/Vocation based. Fighting, magical, faith and thievish abilities rose predictably as a character's level increased. There was no attempt to allow further specialisations nor to permit branching out by acquiring other skills.

2nd edition continued in having set fighting, magical and faith increases based on the character's level. It introduced a whole raft of skills (fighting specialisms, thievish skills, languages, lore, agriculture, crafts &c.) which could be bought alongside the general levelling up. A character's "general" level set a cap on the number of levels a character could have in any of these skills. When a character acquired xps they could be put towards levelling-up or towards gaining or improving these additional skills. 

From 3rd we have Skillscape. It may seem like a leap from 2nd but is really a natural continuation. We still have Vocations but now everything can be a skill. PCF is broken into a range of individual weapon and defensive skills, increases to Body and Fatigue are bought as skills, ML is split into Modes and Methods of magic &c. A character's Vocation originally altered the DF professional skills, so that a Fighter found it easier to learn combat skills, a Mage got the magical skills cheaper &c. The decrease in DF also granted a 10% increase to the base chance [BSC]. Some skills could be considered "Mastered" and this allowed a further decrease in DF. In 5th, this was re-arranged to be simple +10% PCF bonuses.

The big flip in Skillscape is that a character's level is determined by the amount of xp that a character has spent on skill levels - and allowing individual skills to exceed a character's level. However pushing skills beyond a level above one's level came at an additional cost.

Another change along the way is that in 3rd Mastery slots were more limited than in later editions, Mastery slots could be used to promote Secondary skills to Primary skills and characters had to buy their skills from scratch. In 4th/5th a character effectively gets 15 skill levels (from Primary and Mastery) for free.

I'm not keen on 5th's simple +10 PCF%. I can see the reason. Because of the way that resisted skills work it is advantageous to have 40 BSC% + 20 PCF% than to have 50% BSC + 10 PCF%. I also prefer 3rds explicit indication that Primary/Mastered skills are always learned at an advantage, rather than having to pick 10 at the beginning. Also, by keeping the costs the same, but adding a bonus, it nullifies any advantage gained from having a non-standard skill or a competence as a Primary skill.

The final bit is the small amount of experience picked up per annum by starting characters. 500 xp a year is pretty poor for a teenager learning their craft.

Aim

I'd like to bump up the starting experience points gained per year. Hopefully landing a 16 year old character at second level, or close. I don't mind characters starting at 2nd or 3rd level as an 18 year old. Back in 2nd ed a character in their mid 20s might be 7th or 8th level.

If possible I'd like to keep the lower DF for Primary and Mastered skills. If not for standard skills. then for the non-standard skills.

I'd like to be able to push Primary and Mastered skills further ahead of the character's level than the two or three which are currently allowed. My thinking is that while an effective 3 (or 7) levels of bonus is nice for starting characters, it gets a bit lost at higher levels. The thought is return to 2nd ed as having a hard (maybe not utterly restrictive) limit of non-professional skills to a character's level and allowing professional skills to reach something like level*1.5 or level * 2.0.  So a third level character might be limited to +15 PSF (+att bonus) for a primary skill while at tenth (with 15 levels in a skill) they'd be at +45. 

This will take a few experiments.

The Three

The good, the bad and the Body

 

In which I get the character ready for picking a Vocation

yes - this is getting a lot edits as I go.

Step 6: Curses, Talents, Flaws, Hinderances

It goes without saying that these are all setting and campaign dependent and are subject to a degree of GM fiat. Looking at the lists in 5th.

Modifiers to APP become TSC modifiers to GM chosen Charismatic skills.

Curses: Those which mark the character as supernatural (red eyes, blue flames) could well get them killed in some circumstances. I'd save those for separate effects from dabbling in the wrong kind of magic. Those which impede charismatic skills will be useful. I note that the curses in the rules are mostly ongoing afflictions, rather than dooms or fates - which could be good story hooks in a finite campaign.

Talents: Overall, a good collection - and some could be inverted as curses or F,D&D. Some belong in high-mana or heroic systems. I like the idea of adding an "exceptionally tall (height = race max + D5)"

Flaws, Deficiencies & Defects: I think that some Curse rolls should redirect here. I dislike the personality based ones which require die rolls. I'll save those for NPC traits or allow PCs to roleplay them. 

Hinderances: In one sense they're only relevant in a world where mystical enlightenment is possible, and maybe only when using the religion rules from 5th. They are generally more interesting than the personality traits from F,D&D. I like the idea of PCs having consistent personalities but many players groove on the old D&D Chaotic Neutral - ("my character will do what I want, when I want. which is whatever seems the most rational and cautious choice").

If one were to attempt a port to Glorantha we'd be looking a rune affinities and passions here. 

Step 7: Character Size

Height & Build: All good.

Weight: I prefer to use the Universal Height & Weight Table from 3d. Simply because it doesn't presume a linear relationship between height and weight. 

Step 8:Fatigue, Body, LCAP, Jump

Nature/Nurture? We know run into a set of calculations which represent a character's physical abilities. Many (All?) of these can be improved to some degree (usually 25% to 50% by the investment of xp as skills). We, therefore, assume that physical Attributes represent a mix of a character's potential and a generalised measure of achievement around the age of 16. Personally, I think that any stat over 15 has to be partly the result of one's environment and training.

Fatigue

This sum has remained consistent between the Skillscape editions. Humans will probably score 20 - 40 on this scale. This can be improved by up to 50% which is a large potential improvement.

Quite what happens when you run out of it is a bit hazy. Consensus between editions is that a Stamina check can stop you from collapsing - but does it always lead to burning up Body. The combat rules allows characters to keep fighting, but with differing effects [3rd loses half PCF, 4th/5th lose AP].  Presumably the combat rules reflect a high-adrenaline situation - where a stamina check after the combat could lead the character finally collapsing.  

Speaking of which I will change Stamina from STR+CON to FER+CON.

Between 3rd and 4th editions the basic recovery rates are upped by 50%. I'm dubious about this. But having looked at the old (2nd) overland movement rates, I'm inclined to change how FPs are spent and recovered. I will cove that when I look at Overland Movement. 

To Do: have a look at what a stamina of 20, 30, 40 might allow a character to do. This will be covered in a future post on movement.

To Do: look at using 15 or 20 * (con factor+str factor).

To Do: look into stamina rolls.

Body

This is why I went back to get the 3rd edition rulebook. The calculation changed from Weight/20 + CON + STR*0.5 to  1.5* SQRT(Weight) + CON + STR*0.5.  In principal it's a good change but it tends to increase Body by 25% to 50% in normal human range.

My calculation will be SQRT(4x Weight *(con_factor + str_factor)) where:

con_factor = same as factor from the strength factor for LCAP.

str_factor = max ( lcap_factor - 1.0, 0.0)

This gives results similar to 3rd for the average human range. It will be smaller for light and low-con characters and higher for those who are big and tough.

LCAP, CCAP

Between 2nd and 3rd edition LCAP changed from being the weight a character could lift to shoulder level to being the weight a character could lift over their head.

From a website which collated a lot of training data, I have the following table to consider. They did male and female tables at 10lb intervals, but this is the (male) summary. 

	Novice	Beginner	Intermediate	Advanced	Elite
Shoulder Press	0.35	0.55	0.80	1.10	1.40
Bench Press	0.50	0.75	1.25	1.75	2.00
Dead Lift	1.00	1.50	2.00	2.50	3.00

The idea of the publish LCAP multipliers as being "over one's head" values seem hugely optimistic. There is a Lifting skill which increases one's LCAP and we can consider this the difference between Advanced and Elite - technique v. brute strength? I can't find quite what I'm looking for, the ratios for squats or lifts to the shoulder don't gel neatly. So I'll just think of LCAP as being a weight that can be lifted into a suitable position for carrying.

or at least a muscle specialisation. For Absolute Strength (AST) we should use the first calculated LCAP. 

I'll take the Bench Press as a starting point - mostly because it fits quite well with the existing strength factors. I've been kind to STR > 12, the little kink has been removed. While STR*20 is still a little lower than early editions, it still gets a little boost.

STR	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
FAC	0.25	0.3	0.35	0.4	0.45	0.5	0.6	0.7	0.8
STR	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19
FAC	0.9	1.0	1.1	1.2	1.3	1.4	1.5	1.6	1.7
STR	20	21	22	23	24	25
FAC	1.8	1.9	2.0	2.10	2.25	2.5

LCAP:  This is a measure of what a character might reasonably lift without too much effort. 

To Do: Dead lift. Probably use Lifting & Carrying as a skill as well as an LCAP boost, a success raising LCAP by some factor of the crit die.

CCAP: In earlier editions CCAP and LCAP weren't distinguished, fatigue and loading effects were calculated against the one value [STR_FACTOR & WEIGHT]. I'll be working in terms of LCAP later. In the LCAP section of the rules there are Fatigue penalties associated with carrying more than CCAP (or LCAP/2) 

Is this sensible? A 14 stone warrior with STR*13 has an LCAP of 216lb. By the rules in the LCAP section they might carry a 100lb load with no difficulty. A quick internet search shows that the US army would like 50lb and notes that marching rates are decreased at loads greater than this. If we look ahead to the overland movement rates, we see "Walking Pace 2mph 1FP/h, with an extra FP cost if load > 0.5 CCAP"; "Marching Pace 3mph -2FP/h with an extra cost when load > 0.4CCAP".   If our hero carried 100lb they'd be carry almost 100% of CCAP - or 5FP/3miles walking, 6FP/3miles marching. 

Unladen, a 15 mile walk would cost 7.5FP; a 15 mile march would cost 10FP.  With a 100lb load our warrior would be spending 22.5FP walking and 40FP marching. With a 50lb load, the walk is as if unladen, the march costs 15FP. We can assume that a modern day soldier's training will include  Endurance along with Lifting & Carrying Weights. 

The Weight of Things: By the rules, we halve CCAP when carrying objects in the hands/arms rather than in a well organised pack. As characters may be doing both, I will borrow from D&D's Enc system and make things "heavier" or "lighter". Clothing and worn armour might weigh 0.75 their actual weight for determining their effect on carried load; packed items, those hung on a belt &c. will weigh the same. Hand/Arm carried or loads that need constant adjustment might "weigh" twice (or in a range 1.5 - 2.5). I'm getting curious about carrying capacity, fatigue and overland movement. I'll tie that all together into a single post - we're straying away from basic chargen.

Absolute Strength. Although, since the 1st edition, it's been noted that LCAP is a better indicator of a character's strength in real terms, it was 4th which introduced ASTR (as SQR(LCAP)). This is now the stat for calculating a damage bonus. It lies in much the same range as STR but requires a character to be big as well as strong to get the higher values.

I'm not yet sure where I'm going with combat, but I do know that I want an STR derived score of 4*LOG(LCAP/16,2). This lies in the same range as above, obviously scoring lower for troll sized beasties, but allows me to multiply with simple arithmetic. This will become involved in Bashes.

Step 9: MOV / BAP

I don't intend to use MOV / BAP as written for combat, but the value will be used.

Step 10: Traits

Nothing to say here. A little bit of personalisation. Remember that  APP has been removed as an Attribute - being replaced by charismatic modifiers from talents and hinderances. Most characters won't be acquiring great beauty or hideous scaring here. 

The Three (Satellites of Love)

Attributes

 Intro

Being the first part of character generation.

Step 2: Choose Race, Sex, Culture

It's quite possible that the 'Horoscope' method is dependent on the race chosen. Should the GM allow non-humans of course. 

Horoscope may be culture dependent too.

Step 3: Aspect & Horoscope

I'll lump the together. It's possible that there's a method that gives both results at once. The main point is that it should be appropriate to the culture where the character starts. 

I'll hold Aspect in hand for the moment. My magic and religion system is system is still too vague.

Whatever method of determining the birth omens is chosen, I like the provision of two mastery slots. I'll disregard the attribute floor/ceiling introduced in 5th.

Archaeology: In 1st and 2nd the horoscope gave xp modifiers for different types of activities. So a character might get be fated to gain more xp from commerce than combat. My preference is for the newer system.

Step 4: Background:

This is all very setting and campaign dependent.

I believe that there is a case for GM involvement, especially in settings where social rank is more rigid. It's going to be easier to 'get a party together' if they're planned to do so. They don't all have to come from the same social class.

In the 3rd edition GM guide it's hinted that 'historic' High Chivalric is not the most conducive to playing a mixed party. In Dark Ages and Early Feudal we have more flexibility for moving between social classes. In Late Feudal, while nobility stays a closed shop, the importance of knights diminishes, eroded by more militant peasantry and, too a larger extent, the rise in the power and importance of cities. That said, what we might call the Arthurian-High-Chivalric - the world of the Dark Age tales updated to Chivalric ideals remains appealing (in the manner of Pendragon).

Both pre and post High Chivalry are appealing. The former has more room for monsters, a less organized church and the potential for successful warriors to be admitted into the landed classes. The latter provides a less martial backdrop for the traders, the intriguers, the guildsmen, the learned to operate in. 

I'd drop the attribute mods (Peasant = +2 STR &c.) which appear in the tables in the core rules. (Why should a townsman be more agile?). I have considered allowing different classes to buy some attributes at a different rate, e.g. A peasant may buy CON with a schedule ending 16:16, 17:17, 18:19, 20:21, 21:24 but buying INT as 14:14, 15:16, 16:18, 17:20, 18:22, 19:22, 20:24 as a reflection of nurture over nurture but it seems a bit of a faff.

An important detail which is missing is the question of whether the character is married. I've read that commoners tended to marry in their late twenties, so that's not an issue. But as you go up the ranks of landowners and nobility there's a good chance that an arrangement of some type will have been in place, driven by hopes of political alliance and the need for heirs among a warlike class. I have no rules proposals here. 

Step 5: Attributes

The bones of this post and where the merging of editions really begins. I am not at all keen on the use of derived Attributes, feeling that Skillscape removes the need for them. I earlier editions they were used to generate 'factors' (see archaeology, below) and to provide Characteristic Rolls for areas now covered by individual skills (esp. Charisma). 

Surveying the three editions I'm looking at:

Strength, Constitution: Nothing much to say here. I'm pleased that 4th distinguished between STR and ASR. The former is the basic statistic and is considered to be relative to the character's size, the latter is a calculated value showing the character's strength in absolute terms. More on that later. Personally, I think that some non-human races are still a bit muddled.

Agility, Dexterity: In 3rd and earlier, the attribute was called Dexterity. In 4th the main attribute is Agility and DEX is an optional 'semi-derived' attribute (take AG and modify up/down by a die roll or points cost). In 5th DEX is the main attribute and AG is derived ( Ave(STR,CON,DEX) +/- modifier).

When split, DEX covers hand-eye coordination and micro muscle control, AG is grace and macro coordination.

Having AG dependent on CON doesn't ring true with me, it also messes a bit with Build. I'd be happy with just AG, but the skill listings now use both values. 

Intellect, Wisdom: Yes, we're still in D&D attributes. To a degree INT is reductionist, WIS is holistic. 

Discipline: This was new in 3rd edition as a replacement for Ferocity. A measure of drive, determination and the ability to focus on the job in hand.

Bardic Voice: Another stat which has always been there. It covers a wide range of communication ability. Quality of voice, fluency of speech and word choice and all wrapped up in this. It is fundamental to all charismatic and to many performance skills.

Appearance: Another long running attribute. I dislike it as a major attribute. In 1st and 2nd edition it is a component of Charisma. It's only use in Skillscape is as an attribute for the Charm skill. As the assessment of Appearance varies in time and place and as an appearance which improves Intimidation is probably not the same appearance which improves Charm, I'm going to assume that characters are generally non-descript and instead introduce advantages which alter the PSF for specific skills. For non-social characters this is a bit of a points dump.

Spirit: I'm going to wait to until religion and magic are more settled in my mind before attempting to define it. In 1st this would have been Alignment, in 2nd and 3rd this was Piety. These days it's a little closer to BRP's POWer. It must intermingle with Aspect but I'm not yet sure how.

Ferocity: This comes back in 4th as an optional derived attribute. Ave(STR, WIS, DISC) +/- modifier. In 5th it becomes non-optional. I think that it deserves to become an attribute in its own right - and anyway, the 5th edition supplements are beginning to take it on in skill descriptions. I will leave its use as a character's morale to NPCs. I see it as a measure of a character's willingness to take short-term physical risk for potential gain and to overcome physical discomfort. 

I would use it to replace DISC in the combat skills and convert skills like Axes, Maces to STR+FER from STR*2 (Weapons where you're getting in close while making big swings with a weapon best used for attacking rather than parrying). Stamina can become FER+CON. A new skill, Fortitude(?) FER+FER to be used in some cases where Willpower is currently used and to resist pain. It could be an attribute associated with training large beasts, and for a skill like Deter Predator where the character is facing down wolves and bears.

Charisma: This was a derived attribute in 1st and 2nd. 3rd did away with it, preferring to break the charismatic skills down to two key attributes. In 4th it became an optional derived stat (WIS, APP, BV) and could be substituted for the second listed attribute in charismatic skills. In 5th this change is non-optional.  So, most charismatic skills are now BV + CHA. I will ditch it and use the attributes as listed for 3rd/4th. Intimidation is now BV + FER. Charismatic skills are good place to apply PSF modifiers from talents, advantages, flaws, curses &c.

Final Decision:

The ten basic attributes are STR, CON, AG, DEX, INT, WIS, FER, DISC, BV, SPR.

The simplest change to the point based generation is to increase the allowance to 140 points. This allows characters to have better than normal starting stats while not being too extreme.

 Most characters will have three or four stats which they wish to increase and this will allow something like { 17, 17, 17, 15, 13, 13, 12, 10, 10, 10 } or { 20, 17, 17, 14, 13, 11, 10, 10, 10, 10}.

It is possible to push two stats to 20 while not going below 10 in any other stat. I would discourage this.

An alternative might be to initially set DEX to the same value as AG (for humans) with the option to raise one a single point at the expense of the other. [Yes, there's a little 1 point advantage if you pick AG:15 and then shift].  I will allow a further 1 point shift for characters with certain backgrounds - sedentary craftsmen might raise DEX at the expense of AG, physically active professions might raise AG at the expense of DEX. It has the potential to become a dump stat as the major combat and magical skills are still AG based and it's the craft skills which use DEX.

When rolling stats, DEX is a stat in its own right.

Stamina : CON + FER

Charismatic Skills : Back to 3rd/4th. Usually X + BV

Intimidation : FER + BV

Fortitude : FER * 2.  May have some use. 

On Older Derived Stats

PMF, PFF, PCF &c. All involved averages and maybe some other mods.

I think that Skillscape has rendered them all redundant. Let's look at 2nd edition PCF.  This is a factor which determines of your combat abilities; number of blows, weapon attacks and damage, shield parries, weapon parries and dodge chances.

In 2nd edition it was (DEX + STR + WIS + IQ + CHA + FER)/12 * class_factor and increased by 1.5 or 1.0 per level depending on one's class. CHA was (DEX + WIS + IQ + BV + APP + FER)/6 with additional modifiers for extreme stats,  e.g. FER below 9 or above 16 would move the number.  How does one's BV make one's axe swing faster?   [1st brings in CCAP to account for ASR, has a slightly different average and a possible extra +1 or +2 for a good DEX].

In 4th the derived Charisma included some modifiers for extreme stats which is good. 5th removed them and so if you wanted to try the classic D&D trope of a "dex fighter" you'd need to average 16 points in STR, CON & DEX and spend some more points to get 20 AG. Without the mods for extreme values, the derived stats will become more middly - which is a shame for combat or charisma based characters. [As a side note the Attribute bonuses to PSF in 5th make it more useful to have a high stat and a mediocre stat than two good-ish stats. If AttA + AttB == 28, in 5th you get the same result for A==B==14 (giving a +4) as in 3rd/4th but the higher one goes the bigger the bonus A=20; B=8 will net a +8. 

The Three (Fans)

 And so we begin...

The past three editions of C&S have much in common and are largely compatible. While parts of each agree with me, none are quite what I also have quibbles with each. My heart is with 4th, my head is with 3rd and my wallet is with 5th. I may beat up on 5th from time to time, but the supplements are great.
I don't want to drift too far - the easier it is to translate supplementary material the better.

1st and 2nd will get mentions out archaeologic interest. 

It Started With a Bash

Since doing some hand calcs back, when it was new, I realised that the bash rules didn't really work. I've been minded to investigate that for a while. Unfortunately, external factors have made me want to revisit combat in general..., then there were a few niggles with magic.. , and recently I've taken acquired a new perspective on religion.   

If I'm looking at all of that, I may as well look at char-gen, skillscape and experience! 

I may want to glance at the C&S staples,  diseases, poisons, warhorses, castles, holdings, influence, marketplace, overland travel and the like. I'm expecting this to be mostly archaeology. tbh, I think that these topics have remained unchanged for edition after edition, except maybe for nomenclature. 

Aims & Preferences

I particularly enjoy Earthly low-magic settings, or at least settings where much of the world functions much as it would were there nothing supernatural going on. Call of Cthulhu, Regime Diabolique, Deadlands &c. More Game of Thrones than Lord of the Rings, if you like. 

I want a coherent and functional world into which the mythical may re-arise and the supernatural, superstitions and religions can be real. I don't want to concern myself with imagining how a high-magic might function. I read more history than I read fantasy or swords and sorcery.

C&S by name and spirit looks to implement something akin to North Western society roughly between C11 and C15 and that will be my main focus. Its history includes forays into medieval Japanese (Land of the Rising Sun for 1st and 5th), Viking, Celtic, Mongolian (e.g. Swords & Sorcerers for 1st and 2nd) and suggestions that it can be applied further in space and time. Therefore, I don't want to tie it necessarily to its original setting.

I will ignore non-human characters for now. Having non-human character creation is a core concept in C&S, whether for PC or NPCS.

Let's go in the order defined in 5th.  The steps in character creation differ between 3rd/4th/5th. 

Edition
3rd	4th	5th
Choose Method		Choose Method
		Horoscope
		Aspect
Race (/Sex?)	Race/Sex	Race/Sex
Personal Attributes
	Choose Method
	Aspect
	Personal Attributes
Aspect
Social Class, Family Occupation, Status, Position in Family
Curse, Special Talents, Deficiencies, Defects, Fears
		Personal Attributes
Size, Weight, CCAP, BAP, Jump
Horoscope	Horoscope
Age, Physical Traits, Vocation, Skills

My preference is to follow 5th in general. Personal Attributes will move up to lie between the background bits and the 'special features'. I'd like a player to know what they're working with before assigning Attributes. Curses, talents &c. will be a twist on top of their planning. I'd like the option to modify Attributes as an ability or defect (as some existing ones do) and for those I'd like the starting values to be known. 

Step 1: Character Creation Method

Not much to say here. I suspect the most common method will be the points based method, usually employing bought Attributes and usually rolling or defaulting on the various tables (in preference to spendings points there).
The 130 (125 in 3rd/4th) Points will buy stats averaging around 14. Or a few big numbers with many a touch lower. 
The stock NPCs have attributes costing in the region of 100-120.  
The Heroic (150) and Mythic (180) are too rich for my blood. 
I'd allow 5th edition rolling [roll 3d10 keep 2]. It has a nominal average about a point lower than the point-buy allowance, but may produce some big numbers.

Archaeology

4th's Historic point allowance was 125. 3rd had the same (and some randomized options). 2nd was a randomized allowance (for characteristics only) and 1st was entirely random [Stats on a d20 each!].

The rolling option for 3rd/4th was 10 or 11 sets of 2d10 to be allocated as one wished. Almost certainly worse than point-buy.

Light, effectively, allows 90 points for the 9 stats. But doesn't charge extra for numbers over 15. 

The Three (Adventures)

The C&S Library

 Before we begin

I've recently acquired a few new items for the shelf. A copy of the Red Book and the 3rd Edition GM book (with any 3rd core rulebook) for 15 quid a postage. The 1st edition rules will be an interesting read but really I just wanted the GM book. Another 12 pounds bought me a copy of Light.  The library is now well stocked... plenty to dig into.

Before I go blundering into my own attempt to form a version of my very own, a quick overview is in order.

1st. 1977

The Red Book

A quick scan last night reveals it to be less intimidating than it was in '78, but I have yet to look at magic.

The story goes that it was written as a reaction to D&D's vagueness about life outside of dungeon crawling and to place the characters into a functioning world. Unlike RQ's jump to a truly alien world, this is a blend of feudal Europe and Tolkien -isms.

I don't expect to draw on this other than to note the origins of C&S tropes. 

It has a firmly D&D-ish approach to characters, we have the attributes (Strength, Con &c) and a Vocation (read Class) & level system. As per the D&D of the time being of a non-human race was a class of its own.

Here we encounter:

• Lot's of hard and soft information on a feudal setting. Mass combat, a detailed market place with 'realistic' rather than D&D's 'frontier' prices, Castles, Sieges, Heraldry, feudal holdings, demographics, a real interest in warhorses, jousts, law & justice &c.
• Social status and influence.
• Body (hit points) determined by character's weight and constitution which creeps slowly upwards as characters level up.
• Combat with multiple Blows in a round. Bashes, critical hits, generally fixed weapon damage, armour with some degree of absorption. I'd thought that variable armour absorption was there but it's only special cases for heavier armour  (One's Personal Combat Factor determines number of blows, amount of damage &c.)
• Clerics are firmly tied to the Catholic church of medieval Europe. Not really healers who are handy with a mace.
• Magic (I won't be writing Magick) can be complex - certainly in gaining, if not using. In depth rules for creating magical items which involve gathering and enchanting the required materials. A number of specialised schools of magic. Magic is far removed from the wizz-bang stuff found in the  D&D of the time. It devotes a fair amount of space to the summoning of demons and devils.
• An experience system which discourages mages and clerics from risking their lives when the could be praying and doing good works or could be researching spells, enchanting material and building magical devices.
• A keen interest in trolls. Goblins, orcs, trolls and giants as playable races. All humanoid NPCs will play by the same rules as players - one might encounter a 5th level orc captain or a 2nd level non-combatant human merchant.

Swords & Sorcerers

A supplement which extends the reach of the game in space and time. It includes rules and information for playing in Pictish, Celtish, Vikings and Mongol societies. My copy is long gone but I do have the .pdf edition which maintains the original text but updates a few of the rules for 5th (?) edition - certainly for SkillScape.

There were some other supplements for this which I never seen, let alone owned. I only own it now as it was part of a bundle. I'd like to see Bireme and Galley but I'm not going to track down the other stuff.

2nd. 1983

The Three White Books

This is immediately more approachable than 1st. Three stapled booklets which have withstood the rages of time, a better layout, more legible text &c. It's very much a revision of 1st, mostly nips and tucks. The mass combat rules and a few other bits from 1st are missing from this set.

The important change is that it allows characters to become more individualised while staying firmly in the Vocation\Level system. Basically it allows characters to spend xp on specific skills alongside spending xp on advancing in levels. Thievish skills, agricultural skills, lore, languages and favoured  weapons can be advanced individually - but not beyond the characters level. Levels still dictate overall combat skill (PCF), magic and faith levels and the increases in Body and Fatigue.

It is quite playable and, the last time I looked, had a loyal following.

Sourcebook 1

Here we get the mass battle rules, sieges, military campaigns, economy & commerce, diseases, physicians, heraldry, overland travel and hunts. I believed for many years that the mass combat rules, simpler than 1st, were broken. There's a series of steps ending up with "roll a d6 and apply these modifiers". It turned out that I was then meant to consult the crt from 1st edition (which I no longer owned).

The stars of the show are the Forester class and the first printing of the essay Monsters Are People Too.

Sourcebook 2

I've recently asked ebay to send me a copy. I think it'll prove mostly uninteresting. I know that there's a lot of info on lock picking and door breaking along with an extensive guide to building NPC mages. 

3rd. 1996

Core Rulebook

This got the cold shoulder from the 1st/2nd edition fans. A good chunk of the "authentic medieval flavour" is dropped and it feels a little more generic fantasy. That is especially true around magic - while research and enchanting remain it loses a lot of the earlier magic systems. Another problem is that it scrapped the traditional Blows system of combat and introduced a messy and awkward action point system and did away with Bash. 

It is, however, the origin of the Skillscape system. While characters continue to have vocations and levels, the emphasis is on raising individual skills. Everything which used to rise automatically by level is now a skill in its own right. A character's overall "level" is a function of how much xp has been spent on skills and acts as a brake on how much skills can be improved. This pushes characters to developing a dozen or so skills rather than continually one or two favourites to the detriment of the others. A character's vocation simply influences the xp price paid for levels in a skill. In a sense it's a completion of 2nd edition's side-skill system.  It's neat and I'm a fan of it.

The only reason I went back to find a copy is that the Bestiary isn't fully compatible with later editions due to changes in armour, body and damage values. Re-reading it recently, I'm finding some it preferable to what came later.

Bestiary

A truly brilliant bestiary. Being C&S it only covers European wildlife, Tolkien-y beasts and monsters from myth and legend. Everything gets full stats, a lot of description about behaviours and habitat and finally notes on which parts of the creature may be useful to mages. It's the only standalone bestiary of this scope in the C&S range. 5th has a European Folklore bestiary which, as the title suggests, concentrates on folklore rather myth, legend and general fauna.

Game Masters Handbook

I didn't bother this until recently. I picked up a copy after finding a few references to it in the core rulebook.

In a peculiar move, while the core rulebook has a picture of a knight charging with a lance on the cover, this has a Gandalfian wizard, an axe armed dwarf and some hooded figure preparing to do battle with whatever's behind the door... a classic generic fantasy image.

BUT inside is what we were missing. A new initiative system which is a lot closer to Blows, articles on world building, castles and medieval justice, expanded family vocation tables, rules for intoxication, drowning and diseases. A lot of stuff that may have made the core rules more acceptable to the old hands. It's even got an updated  version of Monsters Are People Too.

Knight's Companion

A splat book devoted to knights. We kick off by dividing the feudal period into three parts (Early, High, Late). In each we get the expected historical fluff along with notes on available equipment and additions or amendments to the skills. Then peasant revolts, courtly love, jousting and tournaments return to the C&S world. Chivalric and Holy Fighting Orders are covered. All in all it's traditional C&S.

Dwarves' and Elves' Companions

A couple of splats for those who like to play Tolkien/generic fantasy elves and dwarves. It provides them with all they need. Vocations, skills, magic, social backgrounds and the like.

Armorer's Companion

Two new vocations (armourer and armourer magus) with accompanying skills. From memory it's the first time that the creation of magical weapons and armour has been covered.

Warriors' Companion, Sorcerers' Companion

So far as I know these don't exist. Reading through the magic rules of the core rules there are many references to the SC, hinting that there was more material planned which may have made the magic system more amenable to the veterans. A note in the GM book tells us that the WC will bring more combat rules. I really wish that these had been published.

Light: 1997(?)

A no frills trimming down of 3rd. The main items of interest are the replacement of APs in combat with a Blows system and the inclusion of some simple Bash rules.

4th (Rebirth): 2000

A three book set. As billed, it takes the game systems from 3rd but pulls more of the C&S tropes into the main rules. Religion gets a deeper look, a (broken) Bash arrives, some tinkering around social background, magic, vocations and skills. 

There were no splat books which I'm aware of. The 3rd edition material is largely compatible - the major difference being that 4th has, generally, slightly higher Body points and armour values. At least for human sized entities, big beasties may require some deeper investigation.

5th: 2020

Core Rules:

Another iteration of skillscape powered C&S. Digs further into religion, looking at Judaism and Islam, saintliness and Holy spaces, shrines and relics. Some of C&S regulars are missing,but there's plenty enough to keep the vibe. There is a

The only significant mechanical change is how primary and mastered skills work (+10%PCF rather than -1DF). Blows return as an optional rule.

Nightwalkers; Goblins, Orcs and Trolls

A couple of splats on lycanthropes, vampires, goblins, Orcs, trolls. There are expanded rules for PC/NPC generation, discussions, sample NPCs and short adventures (which take up a lot of space, but feed the imagination). 

European Folklore Bestiary 

As the title suggests, this a collection of sixty or so creatures from the legend and lore of Europe. 

Sourcebook 1

A very recently produced PDF. A lot is familiar from earlier editions; warhorses, diseases, feudal holdings, mining, commerce. It adds rules for aging and for starting characters beyond 25. There is a section on vocations (and skills) for characters (player and NPC) who are neither war.riors, rogues, priests or mages.

Celts; Dux Bellorum

Not yet published, but on their way. The latter is a post-Roman British setting. The small preview PDFs are very promising.

That's what I've got to get picking at.

The Three

(hmph. A Three Pipe Problem is not quite available on spotify).