Got a bit curious after reading Nobody032's post about chosen being weaker than commanders, and figured I'd share what I find out. - By decompiling the java source code.... again. To establish a baseline, I'll re-share the 3 types of commanders damage progression. Basically, commanders deal damage to trauma and circumstance in a step-down fashion, similar to surround actions. All damage is additive.
Suppressor:
Trauma - 100,75,50,25
Circumstance - 200
Defiler:
Trauma - 200,100,50,25
Circumstance - 300,150
Punisher: (Net damage * punisher effectiveness)
Trauma - 1000,300,100,30
Circumstance - 3000
Now, for Forsaken, damage gets a bit more complicated.
First, we need the forsaken's power constant (PC)- this is the chosen's listed reputation strength (200-2*disgrace) * any additional modifiers to base damage
- Species/Boss modifiers (does not include shattered soul debuff, that gets applied after all other bonuses to actual damage)
- Knowings Target Intimately +50%
- Knowings Target Personally Or obsessed with target +25%
- Defiling - (300-disgrace*2)/100, or (100 + PC) /100
Once we have that value, we can calculate the base trauma and circumstance damage.
Trauma - PC * punisher trauma applied equally to all Trauma's.
Circumstance - PC * 5 * style modifier - damage is applied equally, but only to style specific circumstances. Additionally, several modifiers can further increase this damage, with some effects also applying to Trauma damage.
- Defiler bonus damage -
- Normal - *2 additional damage to specific circumstance.
- Tempt - Change style, and apply temp effect if possible. (side note, if tempting, style becomes a unique 1000% PLEA/EXPO style - but trauma damage is set to 0)
- Traumatize - Base trauma damage becomes PC * 10 for DISG and PAIN, before other modifiers. Circumstance damage becomes 0.
- EXP multiplier
- Distortion bonuses
- Punisher circumstance bonuses
- Dissociative Identity (Shattered Soul) - 20% damage reduction after all other modifiers, to Trauma and Circumstance. (assuming it's effect is active)
So, what does all that mean? Well, let's take a basic 58% disgrace forsaken - That'll cost 18 EE to deploy, and has a reputation strength of 84. So we can expect them to deal 84 base trauma. As for circumstance, they can deal a base damage of 4200, 420, 63, or 12~13 to 1,2,3, or 4 circumstance types.
How does that square up against a 5/3 defiler commander? (Same EE cost, average truama of 93.75, average circumstance of 225 to 2). The defiler wins out in terms of trauma damage (average 93.75 damage). It deals a bit higher average damage, though the forsaken will deal more damage to the demons weaker attributes. In terms of circumstantial damage though? The forsaken wins, by a pretty high margin, if they are targeting 1-2 circumstances. The single target chosen can even beat out a defiler type demon, with under 400% efficiency.
Lets go a bit higher - What about a disgrace of 54%, or 28EE cost? That's comparable to the above demon, with an added suppressor. With a reputation strength of 92, that's going to be a base trauma of 92, and 4600, 460, 69, 14~13. Vs the demons average of 156.25 trauma damage, and ~216 avg. circumstance damage? Again, Trauma goes to the demon, but circumstance? Yes, a forsaken targeting 2 vulnerabilities will deal more average damage, but overall a demon targeting 3 will hit for harder than a comparable chose, for 3. That is, of course, assuming we aren't fielding a 5/5 or 6/5 commander to deal with T3 vulnerability breaks.
So, let's do that. A 5/5 defiler/suppressor commander is 58 EE. We don't have a 58 EE chosen, closest is a 41% disgrace for 59EE. At that level (118 rep), they'll be dealing 118 base trauma, and 5900/590/89~88/18~17 circumstance damage, based on style. Well, those numbers didn't improve - Much better when targeting 2 traits, worse when targeting 3-4. I'm noticing a pattern here....
In conclusion, a baseline chosen will deal less trauma damage than a demon of a similar cost, while dealing much more circumstance damage. Provided, of course, they are targeting only 1-2 circumstances. Otherwise, the demon commander scales better for targeting 3-4 circumstances. Which suggests that in order to use a 3 target chosen successfully, they'll need to have multiple damage modifiers stacked on to match a comparable cost demon.