DevLog #3 Encryption & Compression Aren’t Just Packet Concerns
"Most devs slap on encryption at the socket and call it a day. But for RiftForged, that’s like putting a padlock on a cardboard box. What matters isn’t just the packet—it’s the entire pipeline."
🔐 Why Encryption Matters at Every Layer
In most games, encryption starts and stops at the transport layer:
TLS, QUIC, or AES-GCM wrapped over a UDP tunnel.
That's fine for protecting the pipe; but what happens once the data arrives?
In RiftForged:
- Data lands in memory (DragonflyDB or live entity buffers)
- Gets routed to shared subsystems (AI memory, combat systems)
- May persist to PostgreSQL for future synchronization
- Is rebroadcasted in compressed form to other players
Every stage of that pipeline is a potential leak if encryption is treated as a boundary filter instead of a persistent principle.
🧬 Why Compression Belongs Early
Compression isn’t just about bandwidth—it’s about signal density.
- You’re syncing tens of thousands of state variables per second
- You need to prioritize entropy efficiency without adding CPU drag
- Early compression reduces payload size before logic even hits serialization
In RiftForged:
- Player movement delta → LZ4-encoded chunk
- Combat state diff → Zstd-compressed broadcast to shard layer
- Debug trace packets → Raw + compressed for audit comparison
This means less latency, more throughput, and no wasted CPU cycles decompressing things the system never needed in full.
🛡 Encryption at Rest, In Flight, and In Memory
Most systems:
- Encrypt at send
- Decrypt at receive
- Store plaintext internally
RiftForged:
- Encrypts user credentials at rest (Argon2-hashed + keyed)
- Uses ephemeral X25519 key exchange to derive per-session keys
- Can encrypt AI memories and entity state snapshots for shared actor visibility (if deemed sensitive)
- Is built to support selective encryption in DragonflyDB RAM tiers (e.g., isolate VIP or high-impact actors)
This means the memory you query isn't just fast—it’s trustworthy.
📦 Compression + Encryption = Compatibility Layer
By integrating both deeply into the pipeline:
- You allow cross-subsystem communication without schema bloating
- You remove dependency on external packet guards
- You enforce domain-specific compression (e.g., physics ticks don’t need the same algorithm as narrative event logs)
RiftForged doesn’t treat packets as the boundary—it treats the system as the boundary.
- Encrypted where secrets matter
- Compressed where entropy is high
- Modular so systems don’t bleed into each other
⚙ What This Means for You, the Player
- You get fast, secure gameplay without the rubber-band delay
- Your data is safe. We don't just mean during login, but during every action
- You can trust that what you do, say, and see in the world is real—and that it won’t be sniffed, spoofed, or stolen
And for devs?
This is a call to stop treating encryption like a firewall rule and start treating it like a design decision.
This is what RiftForged stands for: modular principles, encrypted memory, and systems designed with trust, not assumptions.