Rapid Fire is the ability of a ship to shoot multiple times in one round.

By default, a ship or defense unit fires exactly once per round of combat, hitting one random enemy unit.

Each class of ship has „Rapid Fire“ against specific other classes of ship or defense, giving a chance to fire an additional shot against another random unit.¹⁾

Rapid Fire continues until the attacking ship either: fails one of these chance rolls OR fires upon a class that does not receive Rapid Fire from this attacker. (see table below)

The chance of an additional shot is given by: (Rapidfire-1)/Rapidfire

The attacking Cruiser shoots at 1 of the 4 defending Light Fighters and deals 400 damage, of which 10 is absorbed by shields.
The struck Light Fighter is left with 10 hull points remaining and might be destroyed at the end of the round.²⁾
Because the Cruiser has 6 Rapid Fire against Light Fighters, an additional shot is fired with ( (6-1) / ( 6 ) * 100 ) = 83.33% probability.
The extra shot randomly hits the Light Cargo which is also left with 10 hull points remaining (same base Shield Power and Hull as the Light Fighter).
Because the Cruiser does not have Rapid Fire against Light Cargo, the Cruiser ceases firing for the remainder of the round.

See also:

• Ships
• Combat System
• Combat Stats
• Fleet