Speaking of trauma pads, there was this video from two threads ago - completely unscientific - showing a GOST-5A Granit plate, with soft armor and KAP climatic trauma panel, versus an ESAPI with only soft armor against 7.62x54R LPS.
While this video does need to be taken with a grain of salt and then some - since Russia tends to underperform their propaganda, it does show that a technically inferior alumina tile array Granit plate posts significantly lower BFD courtesy of a thick trauma pad. If you reran the rest but gave the boron carbide ESAPI a KAP panel, they'd probably even out.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qVAJa0RR0w
Again, this is only one test and it can't provide a definitive conclusion by itself.