[daleksti]

So, how's the state is synchronised?

Are clients both publishing and subscribing? How do you make that work?

[marcduiker]

Good question, the flow is like this:

1. Clients trigger HTTP function endpoints (add a player, do an attack).

2. Centralized state is being updated (based on Durable Entities).

3. The Azure Functions publish messages to the realtime channel (via a REST based client).

4. Clients are subscribed to the realtime channel (using a WebSocket based connection) and respond to the messages (update player health etc).

So clients are only subscribing to messages that the Azure Functions are publishing.

[daleksti]

Got it, thanks. So clients use REST, which triggers a publish?

[marcduiker]

Yes, the Ably REST API is used within the Azure Functions to publish a message. The Ably platform then uses WebSocket connections to the connected player devices to deliver the messages.