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)