When needing to replicate specific multiple class types in my multiplayer code, I typically find myself adding the necessary class types to an array, and then just replicating the array index as a byte value, which the client just uses to extract the class types from the same array.
I do this because I instinctively feel that sending a byte over the wire during a net game is going to be more performant than sending a class name.
However I have nothing to actually base this assumption on. Am I wrong about this? Is there really a performance benefit (in terms of network performance) in sending a byte value instead of a class a name?
Any insight would be much appreciated 