User blog:NJGW/Robot Wars Missions - Entry 2: Finding machines that are genuinely underrated

In any event that puts multiple people or things into a competitive environment, you'll see fans of those respective fields feel the need to assert their opinion on something relevant to that interest. Sure, calling an athlete 'decent' could be something you firmly believe, but if you want other people to take interest in your opinion you need to be boisterous with it. That's why so many people resort to the terms 'overrated' and 'underrated'. These are two words that are criminally misused, but because virtually everybody misuses them, it becomes the norm for these terms to commonly be used incorrectly. Today, however, we'll try to start righting some of those wrongs, by first pointing out classic examples of machines which are have been called underrated over the years that aren't anymore, before then beginning our search of trying to identify machines which do truly fall into the 'underrated' category.

Classic misuses of 'Underrated'
Underrated as a word is rather simple: something that is underestimated or is not valued as highly as it should be. So how do people so often fail to use this word correctly? It's simple - people think that once you label something underrated that it can remain underrated forever, and that's exactly how we have machines still being labelled underrated when that is no longer the case:

Typically, there tends to be two categories for 'underrated' robots:

The you're-a-very-solid-machine-that-never-truly-gets-to-the-later-stages-of-the-UK-Championship-so-you're-underrated pick:
 * S.M.I.D.S.Y., Diotoir, etc, etc... - This is the typical one for Robot Wars fans to pick out. These machines will always be considered as the go-to underrated choices for the lazy people, and that's exactly where this is where the problem starts: how are these machines still considered underrated when, on polls or threads of underrated robots, they're consistently picked? How can a machine be underrated if everybody is picking it as the underrated pick? If the vast majority of people are saying it's underrated, then how is it actually being underrated? This is a typical example of people not realising that the term is flexible, and just because you once call a Diotoir underrated for beating Tornado, or a S.M.I.D.S.Y. underrated for always getting to Heat Finals, doesn't mean that can't change. The problem is, people are so determined to pick out underrated gems, that if a machine does become more popular over time then people can claim that they were on the hype train before anybody else. This reluctance to adjust, however, leads to multiple examples of 'underrated' machines often being stuck with this tag, even if that tag is long passed its sell-by date...

The because-you're-a-robot-that-didn't-appear-much-and-did-solidly-when-you-appeared-you're-considered-underrated picks:
 * Hellbent, Crusader 2, GBH 2, General Carnage 2, etc, etc... - There are so, so many of these examples. These are machines with good fundamentals and solid weaponry that showed what they were about, but didn't make enough appearances. Because of a fear of them falling into obscurity, people want to call these machines underrated so that they never get forgotten. After some time passes, people certainly have remembered all of these machines - to the extent of many in fact becoming overrated - so why is there the need to call them underrated anymore? People know what they do, people remember them, and people never fail to credit these machines in tournaments - they always holds their own.

''Now, with that in mind, let's try to put together a list shall we? We want to find machines that are genuinely underrated by people, and with reasons as to how and why they are. I'll try to make this list a mixture of my own nominations, as well as ones suggested below. However, as I say, even machines you hate can definitely fall into the underrated category, so if one of these vermins is one that you logically conclude is in fact underrated, do not shy away from nominating them.''

Nominate away!