One section in Magic's big rules document is on "interaction of continuous effects," which explains what order to evaluate abilities that do things like change an object's color or power/toughness. It can matter what order you apply these in, so the game's rules explain how you can determine that order.
Dominion also deals with such effects, albeit in much smaller quantities. The order in which they're applied can matter in Dominion, too. For example, you have to apply Inheritance's type-changing effect before you apply Quarry's cost-changing effect, because the latter depends on the former. But there's no rule that explains why you evaluate them in that order, or that you're not allowed to evaluate them in the other order. There's not even an official name for that type of effect. It's just a thing people seem to know intuitively.
They don't have timing; they just always apply. They look like they do that, and they do, so that's why people figure it out intuitively.
This is only possible due to the particular set of effects. If I had both "cards cost $1 less" and "cards cost $1 more" then you'd need timing. Magic of course has contradictory effects and even loops, where there's no possibility for an answer except an arbitrary one, and you have to look up the arbitrary answer.
The rules for static abilities in Magic are the first thing I'd cite as an example of how no-one knows the rules for Magic. They have printed commons, e.g. Snakeform, that routinely created rules questions that normal players simply couldn't answer.
I have certainly blown it in Dominion on some cards; Inheritance, Band of Misfits, and Overlord should work differently as discussed elsewhere, and I shouldn't have done replacements - Possession, Trader. Sans those things I have a pretty tidy rules set. They just don't compare.