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Well, as the instructor put it: when you are within arms reach of an assailant you are literally one blow away from death. They could have a knife, one cut, you could bleed out before help arrives. One blow to the head with a fist could stun you just long enough to let them land more blows and ultimately beat you to death, or take your firearm and use it against you, etc.

He was very clear - an assailant you've decided is a deadly threat that is within arms reach you cannot be subtle about. There is no aiming, there is no "shoot look shoot" or "shoot shoot look" or anything like that. It is do everything in your power to remove that threat immediately. That means a full mag to take them out of the fight as surly and quickly as possible. We didn't practice it (on dummies, only cardboard targets), but he assured me that he has (with a dummy) and that it is possible to dump an entire mag from a typical semi-auto (i.e. 15 to 17 rounds) into a dummy/body before it falls away in front of you. I don't know, he is much, much faster than me...but then, that's his job.