I think you're taking the Anatolia metaphore too far. If there was a city like Constantinople in the game, I'd give you the point, but if you want a setting that resembles Anatolia, you need Constantinople. No Constantinople, no Anatolia.
For the sake of immersion, I want my Khuzait character to look different than my Sturgian character, which in turn should look different than my Vlandian character and so on.
I have a feeling that we will able to create different characters just like in Warband in time, but perhaps there could...
Why do so many speak as if the combat system and combat animations are the same thing? The former should remain more or less the same, as expected; the latter can and, I'm sure, will be improved until the release.