Two cases where this is applicable: take off and landing.
When launching my rockets, I just let them rest on their engines then take off. The gases expelled from the engine should either reflect off the pavement, causing damage via the exhaust itself, or in extreme cases, the pavement will break up a little causing debris to get in my engines and cause damage that way. This is seen in real life when Starship Superheavy took off and had the engines damaged because it was too close to the ground.
When landing rovers in real life, the engines are always angled away from the craft reducing their efficiency. In JNO this is a high price to pay for an aesthetic detail. The reason this is done in real life however, is because the rocket exhaust will fling loose dirt around so the engines are angled to fling debris away.
If rockets had to be suspended from the ground, or have the engines pointed at an angle to be able to take off and land without damage this would be far more realistic for me. This damage OBVIOSLY, should be scaled with the thrust of the engine, sparing any small craft from the worst of this.