High fantasy is more about fighting, I agree. But there are other fantasy genres that are lesser known. For example, I'm currently writing a hard fantasy novel which is set in a gaslamp/arcane punk environment. It has nothing to do with fighting because it's centered on a mad scientist type of character who spends most of his time plotting and researching.
Yeah, that's what I mean - plenty of fantasy genres that aren't sword & sorcery. Although I think [alternate tech]punk tends to end up in sci-fi or, if you want to be really pretentious, slipstream.
Arcane punk isn't alternative tech tho. It simply means that you have a setting where magic and technology coexist in a way that it's available to everyone etc. And of course there has to be a punk aspect to it, so ideally it'd be a dystopian setting. In my case, the tech level is 1900s and most of it is reinforced or enhanced with magic. There is a pronounced divide between the social classes hence the punk aspect.
Oooh okay, gotcha. Definitely what I see in magazines as 'slipstream'/'speculative' - no idea how that goes for books though.