New Pathfinder Game

So my group and I are starting a new Pathfinder Campaign.  The world is being made from scratch with a fairly abstract take on it.  The PCs will start in a small-ish city, and depending on which way they go from there, I'll know where to expand.  I know there's two elven kingdoms who are very cold to each other, a feudal empire run by knightly orders, a viking-esque conglomeration of tribes, and halflings from the desert.  Dwarfs are going to be pretty standard dwarf fare, what with the underground and the fortresses and the beer.  I'm thinking some vaguely Asian culture in the mountains, and a Gypsy-like group of outcast humans, elves, halflings, and other assorted oddities wandering around.

The history of the world, I think is going to be less than normal.  I've always enjoyed settings where some event took place, and society suffered a setback from it.  Not a backslide into living in caves, but something that causes the big kingdoms to collapse.  Instead of having huge feudal kingdoms for different groups of humans, most of the campaign is going to take place in and around city-states.  They'll have trade and interlocking alliances of course, but there's not going to be Kings and such to worry about.  The military forces are going to be town guards more worried about their city than others.

Of course, this means that there aren't any huge Orc tribes to invade, but that's because no suitable leader has managed to unite the smaller warring factions.  And bandits don't stray too far away from the cities, so they get caught if they start becoming too big.  Rather simple explanations, I know, but they should work fine for my group.  They aren't the type to question stuff, and usually accept that it's just "the way the world is."  Unless it's really out there.

I also want to downplay organized religion.  Not that there isn't any organized religions, but they're kept on a small scale.  And rather than having a pantheon for each race, I think I'm going to have one group of gods, but each race, and different culture, revere different ones to differing degrees and would know them by different names.  This one small pantheon would be supported by a number of 'local' gods.  Hero-cults, worship of sacred locations, or animal spirits that are powerful enough (and have a portfolio that they can be identified with.)

Obviously this is likely to be a fairly low powered campaign, at least until I get back into the swing of being a DM.  The world creation is feeling familiar already, so I have faith that it's going to be good.