As Rodney alluded, not all people like a knife for light chopping but then some do. What a camp knife is is pretty much in the eyes of the beholder, much like a bowie knife. They are generally larger knives that can do light chopping, clearing light brush, used with a mallet to split wood, chop the vegies, quarter a deer, and, in the past, served for defence. They will probably have a heavier, thicker blade, may or may not have weight forward and, as noted, a thicker edge. I like to achieve the last item with a convex secondary grind. They will generally have just a very simple handle without a guard or butt plate. I would have to agree that they are a jack of all trades but master of none, but then many utility knives can be described as being the same. Every knife design has to be geared towards it's intended use and every eliment of a knifes design is a trade off against another characteristic.
I wouldn't consider a stainless steel for making a camp knife unless corrosion was a real issue. But then again, I don't think that stainless steel is all that great for making knives, especially larger one. Stainless steels tend to be more brittle that a tool or spring steel of the same thickness and hardness though some of the more modern stainsless steels have wear resistance that carbon steels can't come close to. However, the flip side of that is having a blade that is difficult to sharpen.
Doug Lester