I'm not certain if this belongs in this subforum but I have been looking for newer games in the same style as Might and Magic 6-8 for a while and have been unable to find any. Does anyone know of anything similar? In particular, a single-player party-based game where you get to create your characters (or at least one of them), an open respawning sandbox world, and real-time combat with a turn-based option (just like MM6-8) or at least a "pause and queue instructions" option like a lot of BioWare games have (Knights of the Old Republic, Dragon Age, Mass Effect, for example),

Notes:
-DRM-free would be preferred, but Steam is OK if there's no DRM-free version.
-Built-in support for mods is preferred.
-Turn-based only/grid movement games like Might and Magic 10/Legend of Grimrock do not count.

Hmm, have you given a look at Wizardry 8? You might not like the combat as much as the combat in Might and Magic, but there are mods out there for it (mostly to speed up the combat and such), and the game is pretty amazing as it is. The stats are quite different, and if you like that game, consider looking into 6 and 7 as well.. Wanting that Might and Magic 6-8 look you probably want to stick with Wizardry 8 though. The reason I bring up 6 and 7 is that you can import your party from 6 to 8. I won't go into the specifics of why you'd want to do such a thing, (aside from mentioning that is pretty awesome in and of itself) but start with 8.. maybe if you like it enough, try to retro-tize yourself enough to slip into 6 and 7. And if you do get those games, don't play Wizardry "Gold", but rather play Wizardry 7 Dos version. Hope that is a good recommendation for you.

Might I suggest Lords of Xulima? It is not exactly the same, but has some of the things you want. You can create your own party and fights are more in line with Wizardry 8 - turn based. There is no movement within the combat. Movement outside of combat is in real time. It might not look anything like M&M games at first, especially since outside the fighting it is isometric. On the other hand, it has great exploration aspect.

You could also try Frayed Knights.

The new Dragon Age game fits most of that criteria I suppose, probably not a helpful suggestion because of how popular it is right now.

Lords of Xulima is pretty close to M&M..

Xulima has combat similar to MM 3-5 and isometric exploration. It's not particularly similar to might and magic 6-8.

Exactly how much M&M6-8 have you played?If L.O.X. isn't close or similar then what is?

The OP stated they were looking for a party based game with real time combat with either a toggleable turn based mode, or an active pause mode. Xulima's combat is exclusively turned based. That's a major difference from MM6-8 and what the OP is looking for. Xulima looks more like Divinity Original Sin with first person combat.
There are unfortunately very few party based RPGs with real time combat these days. It's basically limited to Bioware games and Pillars Eternity.

I beg to differ with you,but I'm not going to argue over something like this...Cheers..

Being in similar situation with OP, always looking for MM6-8-like games, it seems that all such potential games have gone the way of MMO.

the grimrock series are pretty close

Oh I would definitely say Wizardry 8 as well. Only problem is, it's sloooooow, even with with the combat speed-up mod. If there was a mod to make every enemy move all at once, instead of one at a time, I'd play it a lot more.

It's realtime until you encounter battle, then it's turn based. You can set it to "continuous", but I remember that being impractical.

Legend of Grimrock is definitely the closest to Might and Magic. Big difference is that there is no free movement, everything is in a grid.

Wizardry 8 is the other one close to it. Fighting is a bit different in that it is not real time but "continuous"

Listen, if you're really desperate for another Might and Magic game in that style, M&M IX still exists. It's not great, but for an unfinished mess of a game it's not half-bad either.
I'll also echo an endorsement for Wizardry 8, though it's kind of a different thing. [i][/i]