I've been thinking of running a game set during the late bronze age in a fantasy world version of Mesopotamia.
The over-arching concept is something similar to 4e's default setting which is "Points of Light". Civilisation is isolated, most of the world hasn't been explored (at least by human hands) and there's something to find around almost every corner. On top of that, civilisation is much more primitive than is standard in ACKS but still advanced than what people usually think.
The rough concept of the area the players will be in is that the majority of the "Land of Rivers" is controlled by a bunch of loosely connected city-states ostensibly ruled by a single king (Ensi). However, they're disparate as they have their own various city-gods and local-gods on top of the general pantheon of the region. Most of these gods would be considered (by us modern people) to be barbaric as they engage in animal sacrifice, weird cult rituals and various other things, but they still sway lawful / neutral in terms of ACKS. The Land of Rivers has a relatively extensive road and canal system (although the canals regularly get filled with silt and the roads covered with sand and dust) which the Ensi is responsible for maintaining.
To the north-east are the upstart tribes of the black sea who worship dark gods who should have been abandoned by man.
To the north-west is the rising empire of Chasea, who have learned the ways of iron from their earth-god.
To the west are hills filled with hillmen who worship a single god, ignorant barbarians that they are. Beyond the hills is the sea and a nation of fantasy Phoenicians who worship a variety of gods focused mainly around the sea, trade and sailing.
To the far south-west, beyond the Desert Bridge of the Sea, is the ancient lands of An-Khemet. After the fall of the last of their emperors fell to treachery from their sorcerer-priests. Now it is ruled by worshippers of formerly forgotten gods with animal heads, demon-aspects of the deserts themselves.
To the south-east, the land is dead and desert for miles, despite the fact it should be just as fertile as the Land of Rivers itself. This will be the primary adventuring area, as the desert is obviously of magical make.
And all around, desert tribes, relatives of the hillmen of the west, prowl, ransacking caravans and getting fat off their own trade.
Players can come into this as any of the people listed (or maybe even something from further afield, if they're interested in that).
I'll be handling coinage just by stating that the Land of Rivers has its own (pseudo) coinage system, although weights of gold and silver are generally considered acceptable in most cases.
Armour will literally just be each +AC is another piece of armour put on / body part covered. Ironically this is probably better suited to the ACKS armour rules than the standard setting is.
What I'm deciding on is what classes to build / include myself. Some ideas I've had are:
Standard Classes
Fighter
Thief
Paladin (possibly) - Champions / temple guardians. My only worry is that paladin isn't completely suited for all of them.
Slightly Reworked
Zahirans - To be suited to the people to the north-east.
Built Classes
God-blooded (Gilgaki) - Equivalent to the nephilim from the Bible / demi-gods from Greek mythology. These are the dudes that live 500 years and found dynasties.
Priests (maybe) - With specialities suited to whatever god they worship.
Magus - Mages using the ceremonial rules.
Sorcerers - People using magic from some evil entity (not a god, so to speak).
Almost all magic users will be using the ceremonial rules. The only difference will be the sorcerers. Does anyone have any other recommendations class-wise?
I just felt like getting this down and seeing if anyone else had any ideas.