Fantasy
The most interesting magic systems are often the ones that remember kitchens.
Anyone can tell me how a spell levels a fortress. I want to know what it does to a stove, a shirt seam, a block of cheese in summer, or a bucket of rainwater that has picked up the wrong sort of flavour from the sky. Those small choices make a world feel lived in. They also tell you who has to do the work when the glamour runs out.
Fantasy gets more convincing when the magic has to share a house with ordinary life.
Anyone can tell me how a spell levels a fortress. I want to know what it does to a stove, a shirt seam, a block of cheese in summer, or a bucket of rainwater that has picked up the wrong sort of flavour from the sky. Those small choices make a world feel lived in. They also tell you who has to do the work when the glamour runs out.
Fantasy gets more convincing when the magic has to share a house with ordinary life.
The domestic detail matters, but only if the magic actually changes how people behave. A ruined shirt seam is nice. A ruined shirt seam that means someone can’t go to work, can’t be seen, or has to mend it by candlelight because the spell ate the daylight too, that’s where it gets interesting. Otherwise it’s just worldbuilding wallpaper.
The bit people often skip is repair. Any system that can scorch a battlefield ought to leave someone mending the scorch marks afterwards, and that’s where the interesting social stuff lives. Who patches the roof, who replaces the kettle, who gets blamed when the spell takes the curtains with it. Magic is rarely the problem. Maintenance is.