Found this thread while trying to look up the adjusted score formula. This system makes a ton of sense to me, from a statistics angle. Having been on both sides of the median in jams, I understand the “penalty” feeling people are describing though.
This is kind of a silly solution, but it could be effective to simply multiply all of the final adjusted scores by 20 to change the scale to 100 points. The adjusted score effectively becomes a “percentile” rank of sorts. It’s more of a psychological trick than anything, but the difference in scale might mitigate the direct comparison with the raw score that makes some people feel like they got a penalty.