Emberfall/docs/DECISIONS.md

DECISIONS.md — Architecture Decision Log

Record any choice that deviates from or fills a gap in the docs. Newest at the bottom.

Format:

## D-NNN: Title
- Date:
- Context: (what problem / ambiguity)
- Decision: (what you chose)
- Alternatives considered:
- Consequences:

D-001: SQLite + better-sqlite3 as the datastore

• Date: (project start)
• Context: Needs persistent accounts and game state with zero setup for a local build.
• Decision: SQLite file in data/, synchronous driver, WAL mode.
• Alternatives considered: Postgres (heavier setup), JSON files (no integrity/transactions).
• Consequences: Single-process deployment; synchronous transactions give simple double-spend protection. Migrate to Postgres only if scaling beyond one server.

D-002: Lazy time evaluation instead of tick loops

• Date: (project start)
• Context: Game must progress while players are offline.
• Decision: Store timestamps; compute energy/timers on demand.
• Consequences: No background workers, trivially testable with injected clocks.

D-003: Vanilla frontend, no build step

• Date: (project start)
• Context: Reduce tooling surface area for a local-model build.
• Decision: Static HTML/CSS/JS served by Express.
• Consequences: Slightly more DOM boilerplate; far fewer moving parts.