Are ships unable to heal between battles when multiple parties are present in the same hex?

Question

The rules say ships heal

at the end of the combat phase

So, since the combat phase entails all battles, does this mean a battle between players 1 and 2 on a given hex that also contains player 3's ships does not end with healing the winner of that battle before having them engage against player 3? (In essence, they are not allowed to heal until all fighting is done for that entire combat phase.) Such a ruling would be consistent with the rule requiring the most recently arrived players to battle first, as this prevents people from exploiting an upcoming battle by simply drifting in to collect the damaged remaining survivor.

Answer 1

You are correct. Ships are not repairing in between battles between players on a single hex. Repairing ships is done at the end of the entire combat phase along with drawing reputation tiles and placing influence disks. (page 21 of the rules).