Possible Side Effects
Border Personality Disorder - Neurohelmet users can begin exhibiting symptoms of BPD, including difficulty in maintaining personal relationships, emotional instability, and feelings of emptiness and signs of depression.
Antisocial Personality Disorder - regular use of a neurohelmet can cause disregard for and violation of the rights of others, including violence towards others.
Schizoid Personality Disorder - users can become detached and removed from social and emotional interactions, and adopt secretive and solitary lifestyles.
Function
The Neurohelmet was designed to be a mind machine interface, using the function of sleep paralysis and usurping motor nerve signals. With the helmet, the pilot would have the giant robot as a massive numb body. It would move as they wanted it to, and biofeedback would provide stimuli to let the pilot know where that massive machine was moving, and what was underfoot. When the pilot would aim a weapon the machine would mimic the motions.
The helmet functioned, but it was inefficient, and it placed too many human mannerisms into the function of the machine, with the system attempting to match the specific gait of the pilot. Likewise combat was hampered by the awkward interaction system with the weapons. Pilots suffered severe disorientation when not piloting the machines, and in the field these mecha performed in a very mediocre fashion, even if they were more sure-footed and agile.
Service
Neurohelmets never made it into general military use, they were too expensive, required too much maintenance, and the number of psycho-emotive problems the pilots experienced put other pilots off the system. Other non-neurohelmet equipped mecha performed almost as well as the brain-scramblers did. Most were never moved beyond training or testing purposes.
The Sandhurst Incident was the death knell of the Neurohelmet. A live fire training exercise claimed the life of a high ranking high profile mecha ace. While piloting a main battlemech equipped with a neurohelment, the mech suffered an ammo explosion and shut down. The biofeedback impulse from the explosion and the emergency shut down on the reactor caused the pilot to go into a catatonic state and then brain death. The feedback was so severe that his brain thought he was terminal, and it shut down.
The Limited AI copilot, or the Dummy Plug system, replaced the Neurohelmet. The pilot, sharing a neural bridge with the L/AI. The pilot retains their ability to move, and guide the machine. The L/AI controls the movement of the machine and engages the targets that the pilot indicates.
Aftermarket Use
Old Neurohelmets are HIGHLY sought after for things like a basement Cohaagen aparatus, kakugram capture systems, and for Deep Immersion in CogNet simulations. These 'deep dives' are popular among the most jaded of Sim users because the sensation is actually intense enough that it can cause death. While not seeking to actually die, the experiences of a Deep Dive make real life, analog space, seem tame and washed out by comparison.
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? Responses (2)
The cons of wearing one seem to outweigh the pluses for me. 4.5
A classic idea with some shades of Spelljammer in there, I think that the drawbacks are what make this one useful. It's easy to imagine someone who is often 'out of body' suffering psychologically, so I like that you've put some thought into that here.
Interesting aftermarket use, too.
