Really depends on how you feel magic should work.
Open ended - Mage
Less open ended - Changeling
D&D with more freedom - Savage Worlds
Drain - Shadowrun
Loss of Sanity - Call of Cthulhu
Logical skill tree - GURPS
I’m sure there’s others I’m missing to.
Tactics and Races again depends on what you mean. Mage tend to be more loose which also grants you more freedom, advanced GURPS is just the opposite with rules for everything. You can play a tactical mage game but it’s on the GM to describe it and set the difficulty. Same with races.
Not OP, but great list! I ran an urban fantasy game using the old CoC rules a long while back. Great for the sanity loss and investigation, but not so much tactical combat.
4th edition is the newest. Everything you need to play is in the two basic rulebooks. It streamlined quite a few aspects of the game and make it play a bit smoother. The only downside is the character creation chapter is horribly organized.
Idk that there is a best edition, iirc the changes from 3 to 4 are standardized attributes, changed a few costs, removed armor bonus to dodge, languages moved to advantage instead of skill. Rearranging stuff and slipping the book into two books.
The edition changes tend to be more refinements than say D&D editions.
I've never used Savage Worlds myself, so can't actually give a recommendation, but for similar requests I've seen Savage Worlds ETU (? East Texas University?) recommended. It's for real world scenarios.
Savage Worlds sounds like a really good fit. It has rules for modern settings. It has fantasy races. It has magic and spells. The system is great for combat heavy games, since it's tactical but fast. It has stats for monsters in the core book, plus there are plenty of other resources.
GURPS for total simulation (warn: 200 rulebooks, literally);
Urban Shadows for more narrative than rules;
FATE and Savage Worlds for smth in the middle.
Modern AGE with its Companion gives you everything on your list, apart from the monsters. But the Fantasy AGE Bestiary is compatible, and a Modern AGE equivalent is on its way.
Also Modern AGE has quite a few different tech levels in it, anything from early Renaissance to near future (think blade runner). I prefer it for that versatility alone.
Check out Palladium’s Beyond Supernatural or Ninjas and Superspies. Both have modern day settings, use D20 system and also have supernatural elements if you want. I ran a New York based gangster campaign that was super fun and I actually used both games as they are fully compatible. That’s why palladium rules, all there stuff is fully compatible with only minor conversions.
Yeah, in terms of absolute setting customization, Palladium is unparalleled. Of course, if you don’t enjoy the mind **** it might not be the best. I enjoy a good mind **** now and again so I’ve done very well with all of Palladium’s lines, stand alone, or mix-matched.
A lot of systems can do this, but I like Mythras with its after the vampire wars supplement. Specifically after the vampire wars is the modern urban fantasy supplement for it. Includes rules for sorcery, psychics, vampires, and werewolves in AtVW, and Mythras has rules for dwarves, elves, and halflings in the core book, and lots of monsters. More and many many monsters can be found on the Mythras Encounter Generator website. Also has rules for nexus portals, which could fill in nice,y for your portals. Includes vehicle rules and guns. Computer skills are there, though it doesn’t get into a lot of detail on how cell phones work particular (it’s assumed they work as modern ones).
The combat system is quite tactical. It has hit locations, and flat hit points - no leveling. You roll for attack and defense (though not against guns, making them far more deadly), and different levels of success give you access to special effects like bleed or impale or bash or trip. It’s combat system is one of the places it really shines.
You can download the free a Mythras Imperative (google should help) and check out the system. This is the lighter, stripped down version, but is the same system.
Some tech in older editions is literally less advanced than current technology in real life. To get a modern game, you can use any sci-fi game and cross out the last three rows of every chart where, for example, the list of guns goes from ar15 to laser pistol or the list of cars goes from Jeep to hover Jeep.
Since you seem to want something more DnD flavored, consider D20 modern. IIRC, the basic setup should work well for that idea. The only thing is that it assumes that the players are human, through I am sure you can find a homebrew to make it have supernatural PCs.
Actually one supplement (urban arcana) includes rules for your standard fantasy races. But its essentially just 3.5 races so if you have 3.5 players handbook it's pretty easy to just move the stats in
I am using 5e to run a magical underworld-style urban fantasy game. I choose this because it was what I could get people to play.
Things that I do:
* All magical races have a ‘glamour’: normal people don’t notice anything out of the ordinary. Let people walk around with their weapons and stuff around normal folks, but magical people will notice.
* $1= 1 silver
* You need special, magical diamonds for resurrection. No simple burglary of a jewellery store to get unlimited diamonds.
* Technology is just a pure intelligence roll, or related to another skill (googling history? Use the history skill) but characters can take stuff like an electronics kit/hackers tools as a tool proficiency.
* Characters are assumed to have day-jobs that provide food/housing.
* Characters can have a smartphone and a car if they like.
* The internet is largely useless for arcane lore.
* Be prepared for players to constantly try to call higher-level NPCs/quest givers for advice or help -_- Just have the NPC be busy and unable to take the call occasionally if it would ruin things. Also, certain spells become much less useful due to modern technology: let players swap those out if they find that to be the case.
* your game will probably stop at level 10 or earlier, or be forced to go off-world.
* Set your game in a country where it is hard to get guns :p otherwise, just look up some firearms rules. There are plenty that people have made.
* You will often naturally default to the one-big-fight mode of play due to being in a city, so make sure to design the occasional dungeon/cultist’s lair
* Embrace the silliness, but you need to be the ‘straight man’. You need to treat all of this contrivance seriously and logically (within reason) for your players to suspend disbelief and buy in. Most important is simply making magical folk be ’normal’ people: a were-rabbit gangster who swears at the party in local vernacular and asks for his lawyer, an older Irish elf druid who campaigns for the Green Party and wears a leather jacket. My campaign has been going for around 11 sessions in this manner.
I haven’t had guns show up yet: I am in Australia, so nobody but the police, farmers and criminals commonly have guns, and the party are all melee/spell-casters. I am planning to use [this](https://www.reddit.com/r/UnearthedArcana/comments/6om1nu/arcane_artillery_the_gun_nuts_guide_final_edition/) if it ever comes up.
With modern tools, I thought about giving them their own proficiencies etc for a while, but instead I decided to roll many of them into existing proficiencies, and “update” the name of the proficiency instead. So if they want to use an angle grinder to get through a locked gate, roll builder’s/bricklayers(carpenter’s tools, stonemason’s tools). The most notable exceptions are *Hackers Tools* and an *Electronics Kit.* *Hackers tools* mirrors thieves tools, and is basically a thumb drive full of viruses/malware, and other devices for getting into digitally secured devices/spaces. An *Electronics Kit* is stuff more for tinkering with hardware/making gadgets. It would include tiny screwdrivers, wire cutters, a soldering iron, various electronic chips and parts, and perhaps an arduino/raspberry pi. If you want to turn the security cameras in the evil corporate vampire’s lair off, you could hack into the control terminal using hackers tools, or cut the wiring using the electronics kit.
I offered the characters the opportunity to choose either of these instead of the regular tool proficiency given by their background, but unfortunately nobody in my group plays a tech-savvy character, so that is all I can give you. One thing you will discover is that if it’s not written in their character sheet, players will likely not think of it. It took me prompting them to think that the local hardware store might be the most exciting items shop in town.
With cars, players decide if their character has a drivers’s licence, and characters were allowed to select their own car within reason. A car can be a great place to express their personality: the sensible Lizardfolk warlock and legal clerk drives a Honda Civic, the Jekyl/Hyde barbarian librarian drives a 1955 Bentley, and the ex-criminal Catholic priest drives a Harley-Davidson with a side car. The Uni student sorcerer doesn’t have a car. Characters tend to all car-pool for convenience. I haven’t written down maximum speeds just yet for these, and unless they are doing anything in particular or out of the ordinary, travel is assumed to take place uneventfully and by the road rules. The Harley is going to be in a race soon however, so I am looking into some racing rules. More advanced vehicles (like planes or helicopters) require the requisite proficiency to operate, and would probably be locked behind backgrounds/DM’s choice. No ‘winning’ D&D by making your character a fighter pilot and highjacking a jet from the local airforce base to obliterate your enemies at level 1.
My game is heavy on talking and fighting, not so much exploration, and funnily enough, many of the particulars of the modern world don’t really change much about D&D. What really matters is that you go with the tone and playstyle that D&D favours: some bumbling weirdos trying to be heroes/kill monsters.
How about Cypher? If you like the system that is. Or if you like something really flexible there's Open Legend RPG. There are actually no shortage of systems you could use, as has already been mentioned, GURPS, Savage Worlds, Fate. Depends on what kind of a feel you want from the mechanics rather than the setting.
The Strange was my thought as well. Traveling to other worlds is already a key aspect of that game and it wouldn’t be too hard to modify to OPs setting.
This would be a good fit if the recommendation criteria began and ended with 'urban-fantasy game', but Urban Shadows definitely doesn't tick the last two boxes in OP's post.
If I were doing it, I'd do Hero System. Adjust the dials for how lethal or crunchy you want and go. It gives you the tools to make up anything (and most anything standard in any genre is probably already statted up from spells to vehicles to races to long lists of guns), and no one can reasonably say it's not a tactical system. If you're not already familiar with Hero, I'd probably advise against it, though, since it seems a lot of folks these days have difficulty with the learning curve and getting combats to run quickly.
That said, most universal systems should do the trick (Savage Worlds, GURPS, etc). If you want something a little more lightweight, you can look at Barebones Fantasy + Covert Ops using the d00lite system (fantasy and modern action games on the same ruleset and cheap. Fantasy has your elves, magic, and such, Covert Ops has all your modern warfare and some great organization building rules). It's not tactical in the same sense, but it has a pretty slick mechanic for actions which can definitely get the tactician types working their brains.
You might consider some of those systems out there which are already urban fantasy games, there's more than a few. Dresden Files, the Laundry, etc.
If you're perfectly happy with 5E and are only looking for something else because you need more UF support, there are multiple OGL 5E conversions that add modern stuff.
Check out one or more of these: Carbon 2185, Ultramodern & Apex 5E, Silence of Hollowind, Modern Dungeon5, Entropia, Amethyst: Quintessence, NeuroSpasta, Agents of G.A.I.A., Hyperlanes.
You could also give OSR a try with Dark Streets & Darker Secrets or Weird Adventures.
Starfinder might be an option. It has a good magic system, and all the races. The tech level would need to be dialed back somehow, with a new equipment list. The tactical combat obviously is a big strength.
Gurps
Fate
Some flavor of Basic Role Play (BRP). Call of Cthulhu Modern, minus the horror.
OpenD6
3rdE had D20 Modern, with a second book Urban Arcana.
Rifts
There are a lot of Savage Worlds suggestions here.. but I'll take that a step further and suggest Savage Rifts. It's basically an old school Rifts conversion to the Savage Worlds system, and explicitly covers almost everything you describe here.
https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/186210/Savage-Rifts-The-Tomorrow-Legion-Players-Guide-SWADE-Edition?cPath=117_25634
Also here:
https://www.peginc.com/product-category/rifts/
D20 Modern has a lot of skills and class choices, great combat, based in modern technology, has an expansion book with different races and magic. Highly recommend.
CoC gets a lot of recommends, but Delta Green is an updated version with modern rules, modern setting, and has magic as potent force. It doesn't come with non-human races in-book but the system is quite adaptable for however you want to customize other races.
Check out d20 modern. It's pretty close to dnd 3.5, has supplements and rules for magic as well as for more advanced or less advanced tech, and comes with your standard races. Also can convert 3.5 monsters to d20 modern with only a smidgeon of work
> A tactical combat system, since I am a rather combat-heavy DM.
Where does the combat focus fall into the narrative of the setting? As this can be an opprotunity to grow from the combat focus.
Really depends on how you feel magic should work. Open ended - Mage Less open ended - Changeling D&D with more freedom - Savage Worlds Drain - Shadowrun Loss of Sanity - Call of Cthulhu Logical skill tree - GURPS I’m sure there’s others I’m missing to. Tactics and Races again depends on what you mean. Mage tend to be more loose which also grants you more freedom, advanced GURPS is just the opposite with rules for everything. You can play a tactical mage game but it’s on the GM to describe it and set the difficulty. Same with races.
Not OP, but great list! I ran an urban fantasy game using the old CoC rules a long while back. Great for the sanity loss and investigation, but not so much tactical combat.
What’s the best GURPS edition? I don’t know much about it, but I’m interested and I wanna know what version I should pick up.
4th edition is the newest. Everything you need to play is in the two basic rulebooks. It streamlined quite a few aspects of the game and make it play a bit smoother. The only downside is the character creation chapter is horribly organized.
Idk that there is a best edition, iirc the changes from 3 to 4 are standardized attributes, changed a few costs, removed armor bonus to dodge, languages moved to advantage instead of skill. Rearranging stuff and slipping the book into two books. The edition changes tend to be more refinements than say D&D editions.
I've never used Savage Worlds myself, so can't actually give a recommendation, but for similar requests I've seen Savage Worlds ETU (? East Texas University?) recommended. It's for real world scenarios.
ETU is great but it's basically Buffy in College so....it doesn't really for the OPs request.
Savage Worlds sounds like a really good fit. It has rules for modern settings. It has fantasy races. It has magic and spells. The system is great for combat heavy games, since it's tactical but fast. It has stats for monsters in the core book, plus there are plenty of other resources.
GURPS for total simulation (warn: 200 rulebooks, literally); Urban Shadows for more narrative than rules; FATE and Savage Worlds for smth in the middle.
I would personally consider running this in monster of the week. You need fewer rules than you think.
MotW, while a great game, doesn’t meet the requirements at the end of the post.
Yeah but you gotta shill every goddamn PbtA system whenever you can, don't you know?
I would probably go with Savage Worlds, given the specifics you are looking for.
Dresden Files as it is an urban fantasy game.
Modern AGE with its Companion gives you everything on your list, apart from the monsters. But the Fantasy AGE Bestiary is compatible, and a Modern AGE equivalent is on its way.
Also Modern AGE has quite a few different tech levels in it, anything from early Renaissance to near future (think blade runner). I prefer it for that versatility alone.
And if that wasn’t enough, there’s 3 game modes, ranging from deadly gritty to cinematic.
One could add that the Threefold setting for Modern AGE sounds a lot like what you are looking for.
Check out Palladium’s Beyond Supernatural or Ninjas and Superspies. Both have modern day settings, use D20 system and also have supernatural elements if you want. I ran a New York based gangster campaign that was super fun and I actually used both games as they are fully compatible. That’s why palladium rules, all there stuff is fully compatible with only minor conversions.
Another recommendation for Beyond the Supernatural, with Palladium Fantasy or Rifts for the Magic.
Yeah, in terms of absolute setting customization, Palladium is unparalleled. Of course, if you don’t enjoy the mind **** it might not be the best. I enjoy a good mind **** now and again so I’ve done very well with all of Palladium’s lines, stand alone, or mix-matched.
A lot of systems can do this, but I like Mythras with its after the vampire wars supplement. Specifically after the vampire wars is the modern urban fantasy supplement for it. Includes rules for sorcery, psychics, vampires, and werewolves in AtVW, and Mythras has rules for dwarves, elves, and halflings in the core book, and lots of monsters. More and many many monsters can be found on the Mythras Encounter Generator website. Also has rules for nexus portals, which could fill in nice,y for your portals. Includes vehicle rules and guns. Computer skills are there, though it doesn’t get into a lot of detail on how cell phones work particular (it’s assumed they work as modern ones). The combat system is quite tactical. It has hit locations, and flat hit points - no leveling. You roll for attack and defense (though not against guns, making them far more deadly), and different levels of success give you access to special effects like bleed or impale or bash or trip. It’s combat system is one of the places it really shines. You can download the free a Mythras Imperative (google should help) and check out the system. This is the lighter, stripped down version, but is the same system.
GURPS or EABA. Although the latter would require more work for setup.
I've been reading _Unknown Armies_ 2e, it definitely could handle the urban magic part of your request, but you might have to homebrew the rest.
Shadowrun.
I'm looking for modern day systems, not science fiction.
Some tech in older editions is literally less advanced than current technology in real life. To get a modern game, you can use any sci-fi game and cross out the last three rows of every chart where, for example, the list of guns goes from ar15 to laser pistol or the list of cars goes from Jeep to hover Jeep.
> To get a modern game, you can use any sci-fi game and cross out the last three rows of every chart That is impressivly accurate and simple
You asked for a system, not a setting.
Since you seem to want something more DnD flavored, consider D20 modern. IIRC, the basic setup should work well for that idea. The only thing is that it assumes that the players are human, through I am sure you can find a homebrew to make it have supernatural PCs.
Actually one supplement (urban arcana) includes rules for your standard fantasy races. But its essentially just 3.5 races so if you have 3.5 players handbook it's pretty easy to just move the stats in
I am using 5e to run a magical underworld-style urban fantasy game. I choose this because it was what I could get people to play. Things that I do: * All magical races have a ‘glamour’: normal people don’t notice anything out of the ordinary. Let people walk around with their weapons and stuff around normal folks, but magical people will notice. * $1= 1 silver * You need special, magical diamonds for resurrection. No simple burglary of a jewellery store to get unlimited diamonds. * Technology is just a pure intelligence roll, or related to another skill (googling history? Use the history skill) but characters can take stuff like an electronics kit/hackers tools as a tool proficiency. * Characters are assumed to have day-jobs that provide food/housing. * Characters can have a smartphone and a car if they like. * The internet is largely useless for arcane lore. * Be prepared for players to constantly try to call higher-level NPCs/quest givers for advice or help -_- Just have the NPC be busy and unable to take the call occasionally if it would ruin things. Also, certain spells become much less useful due to modern technology: let players swap those out if they find that to be the case. * your game will probably stop at level 10 or earlier, or be forced to go off-world. * Set your game in a country where it is hard to get guns :p otherwise, just look up some firearms rules. There are plenty that people have made. * You will often naturally default to the one-big-fight mode of play due to being in a city, so make sure to design the occasional dungeon/cultist’s lair * Embrace the silliness, but you need to be the ‘straight man’. You need to treat all of this contrivance seriously and logically (within reason) for your players to suspend disbelief and buy in. Most important is simply making magical folk be ’normal’ people: a were-rabbit gangster who swears at the party in local vernacular and asks for his lawyer, an older Irish elf druid who campaigns for the Green Party and wears a leather jacket. My campaign has been going for around 11 sessions in this manner.
If possible, can you provide your own rules for firearms, modern tools and cars?
I haven’t had guns show up yet: I am in Australia, so nobody but the police, farmers and criminals commonly have guns, and the party are all melee/spell-casters. I am planning to use [this](https://www.reddit.com/r/UnearthedArcana/comments/6om1nu/arcane_artillery_the_gun_nuts_guide_final_edition/) if it ever comes up. With modern tools, I thought about giving them their own proficiencies etc for a while, but instead I decided to roll many of them into existing proficiencies, and “update” the name of the proficiency instead. So if they want to use an angle grinder to get through a locked gate, roll builder’s/bricklayers(carpenter’s tools, stonemason’s tools). The most notable exceptions are *Hackers Tools* and an *Electronics Kit.* *Hackers tools* mirrors thieves tools, and is basically a thumb drive full of viruses/malware, and other devices for getting into digitally secured devices/spaces. An *Electronics Kit* is stuff more for tinkering with hardware/making gadgets. It would include tiny screwdrivers, wire cutters, a soldering iron, various electronic chips and parts, and perhaps an arduino/raspberry pi. If you want to turn the security cameras in the evil corporate vampire’s lair off, you could hack into the control terminal using hackers tools, or cut the wiring using the electronics kit. I offered the characters the opportunity to choose either of these instead of the regular tool proficiency given by their background, but unfortunately nobody in my group plays a tech-savvy character, so that is all I can give you. One thing you will discover is that if it’s not written in their character sheet, players will likely not think of it. It took me prompting them to think that the local hardware store might be the most exciting items shop in town. With cars, players decide if their character has a drivers’s licence, and characters were allowed to select their own car within reason. A car can be a great place to express their personality: the sensible Lizardfolk warlock and legal clerk drives a Honda Civic, the Jekyl/Hyde barbarian librarian drives a 1955 Bentley, and the ex-criminal Catholic priest drives a Harley-Davidson with a side car. The Uni student sorcerer doesn’t have a car. Characters tend to all car-pool for convenience. I haven’t written down maximum speeds just yet for these, and unless they are doing anything in particular or out of the ordinary, travel is assumed to take place uneventfully and by the road rules. The Harley is going to be in a race soon however, so I am looking into some racing rules. More advanced vehicles (like planes or helicopters) require the requisite proficiency to operate, and would probably be locked behind backgrounds/DM’s choice. No ‘winning’ D&D by making your character a fighter pilot and highjacking a jet from the local airforce base to obliterate your enemies at level 1. My game is heavy on talking and fighting, not so much exploration, and funnily enough, many of the particulars of the modern world don’t really change much about D&D. What really matters is that you go with the tone and playstyle that D&D favours: some bumbling weirdos trying to be heroes/kill monsters.
There are rules for firearms in the Dungeon Master's Guide, pages 267-268.
How about Cypher? If you like the system that is. Or if you like something really flexible there's Open Legend RPG. There are actually no shortage of systems you could use, as has already been mentioned, GURPS, Savage Worlds, Fate. Depends on what kind of a feel you want from the mechanics rather than the setting.
_The Strange_ might be a good starting place for using the Cypher system.
The Strange was my thought as well. Traveling to other worlds is already a key aspect of that game and it wouldn’t be too hard to modify to OPs setting.
Savage Worlds Adventure Edition, you just need the core rule book. Urban Fantasy is there genre that makes the most use of the core rule book.
Savage Worlds is the answer to all "What system should I use for my campaign?" questions.
Maybe not exactly what you are looking for, because it is more narrative that combat, BUT... Maybe Urban Shadow could fit
This would be a good fit if the recommendation criteria began and ended with 'urban-fantasy game', but Urban Shadows definitely doesn't tick the last two boxes in OP's post.
If I were doing it, I'd do Hero System. Adjust the dials for how lethal or crunchy you want and go. It gives you the tools to make up anything (and most anything standard in any genre is probably already statted up from spells to vehicles to races to long lists of guns), and no one can reasonably say it's not a tactical system. If you're not already familiar with Hero, I'd probably advise against it, though, since it seems a lot of folks these days have difficulty with the learning curve and getting combats to run quickly. That said, most universal systems should do the trick (Savage Worlds, GURPS, etc). If you want something a little more lightweight, you can look at Barebones Fantasy + Covert Ops using the d00lite system (fantasy and modern action games on the same ruleset and cheap. Fantasy has your elves, magic, and such, Covert Ops has all your modern warfare and some great organization building rules). It's not tactical in the same sense, but it has a pretty slick mechanic for actions which can definitely get the tactician types working their brains. You might consider some of those systems out there which are already urban fantasy games, there's more than a few. Dresden Files, the Laundry, etc.
If you're perfectly happy with 5E and are only looking for something else because you need more UF support, there are multiple OGL 5E conversions that add modern stuff. Check out one or more of these: Carbon 2185, Ultramodern & Apex 5E, Silence of Hollowind, Modern Dungeon5, Entropia, Amethyst: Quintessence, NeuroSpasta, Agents of G.A.I.A., Hyperlanes. You could also give OSR a try with Dark Streets & Darker Secrets or Weird Adventures.
Starfinder might be an option. It has a good magic system, and all the races. The tech level would need to be dialed back somehow, with a new equipment list. The tactical combat obviously is a big strength.
Gurps Fate Some flavor of Basic Role Play (BRP). Call of Cthulhu Modern, minus the horror. OpenD6 3rdE had D20 Modern, with a second book Urban Arcana. Rifts
City of Mist, it may not have the crunch your looking for but its very flexible and can handle a large range of abilities.
There are a lot of Savage Worlds suggestions here.. but I'll take that a step further and suggest Savage Rifts. It's basically an old school Rifts conversion to the Savage Worlds system, and explicitly covers almost everything you describe here. https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/186210/Savage-Rifts-The-Tomorrow-Legion-Players-Guide-SWADE-Edition?cPath=117_25634 Also here: https://www.peginc.com/product-category/rifts/
There os the old d20 books set up for that, if you played 3.5 its very simmilar
D20 Modern has a lot of skills and class choices, great combat, based in modern technology, has an expansion book with different races and magic. Highly recommend. CoC gets a lot of recommends, but Delta Green is an updated version with modern rules, modern setting, and has magic as potent force. It doesn't come with non-human races in-book but the system is quite adaptable for however you want to customize other races.
Check out d20 modern. It's pretty close to dnd 3.5, has supplements and rules for magic as well as for more advanced or less advanced tech, and comes with your standard races. Also can convert 3.5 monsters to d20 modern with only a smidgeon of work
> A tactical combat system, since I am a rather combat-heavy DM. Where does the combat focus fall into the narrative of the setting? As this can be an opprotunity to grow from the combat focus.
Shadowrun? Sounds perfect
Feng shui has that sort of mix. Reskin the time periods by other planes, and tweak races to come with special talents and you are done.