Subject: I agree with this advice
Author:
Posted on: 2015-04-22 19:16:00 UTC
I am not familiar with the specific continua you mentioned, so my advice will also be a bit more general. But one thing that has been mentioned a few times, I will mention again. RPG's are great for using as a base. By their nature they typically have fairly clear and well defined rules on magic. If you do not want to go that route, here are some of my recommended approaches to the magic in general.
1. Fullmetal Alchemist. The alchemy is, in my opinion, a grey semi-magic-science thing. But Arakawa (the mangaka) leaves the basics of alchemy pretty basic to understand. There are some interesting facets with alchemy that would make it interesting to work with.
2. Dragon Age: Clear rules, that are fairly easy to understand, also has some interesting story lines you could work with.
3. Based on you fandoms you mentioned in your introduction, you might also want to consider Bleach. You would need to restrain them a bit, but that is beside the point for now. But you could consider Kido, though I do not recall how well Kubo actually explains the inner workings of it.
Just my two cents.