Yep, I finished the Pitt just a few days ago, and was wondering where the supposed moral greyness is. Kill Joe Stalin and the murderous thugs whom he uses to work slaves to death with, and not kill his kid, but give it to someone who will raise it as their own, without ever knowing their murderous father? She is not being kidnapped. Her parents are being killed because they are monsters, and the slaves are simply not killing her in the bargain. Now if you had to decide whether or not to kill the kid, that would add some real moral uncertainty, as she is not responsible for her parent's evil. In most RL slave uprisings, the children of the overlords would have their brains bashed out. Midea shows a great deal of compassion insisting that she not be harmed, caring for her, and paying you to bring her toys.

On the flipside of all this I can join Stalin or replace him as the evil bastich kidnapping people throughout the wasteland and forcing them to work until they literally die. Not seeing the grey area between the two.

I found it almost impossible to choose, and in the end, I still don't know what the right choice is.

@SubRosa- The only reason, and I repeat the ONLY reason Midea even remotely cared about that child, was because it may have produced the cure. Did you ever see Werhner's lab? It's filthy and so is he. If you ever side with Ashur and go to kill Werhner, he flips out and curses the slaves and everyone in the pit.

Ashur is a good man in a bad, bad spot. I think with time, and studying of the child, a cure can be produced, but only if it's with Ashur and his wife, (who actually has scientific and medical training), and by the way, his wife asks for toys too. Not just Midea.

Everything is filthy in the Capital Wasteland, especially when you are hiding out from an evil overlord in his stronghold, so I do not hold that against Werhner. He is doing the best he can with what he has, which is not much. It is clear that he does not love the child. Why would he? But it is also clear that he is not going to harm her either. He is smart enough to know a goose that lays a golden egg. However, the idea that Midea only cares about the child for the cure is not borne out by her actions. If that were the case she would not insist it was not harmed, and would not care about entertaining it, or be work herself into exhaustion in caring for it.

I never took the Raider side, so I cannot say anything one way or another about what Werhner does if you side with Ashur. But I do know that whenever Werhner refers to the slaves, he does so as "us" and "we", not "them". This tells me that while he was a Raider himself, he is certainly not one anymore. Ashur tells us that he was one of his lieutenants, who turned on him. We do not know why. Ashur would have us believe that it was to take power himself. But we have only the word of slaver and a mass murderer to go by don't we? Werhner could have many reasons for trying to depose Ashur, including the one we actually see in the game, to free his people, the slaves of the Pitt.

Ashur is nowhere near a good man. Go back and play it again. Remember when you first enter the Pitt, and there are people trying to leave? Remember them being gunned down? Remember walking inside, and finding another group of people lined up on their knees accused of helping them try to escape? Remember them being gunned down? Remember walking through the mill, and seeing a slave collapse from sickness and exhaustion, a raider coming over to kick him for a while, then coming back and killing him? That is Ashur's utopia: a mountain of corpses. Every slave in the Pitt will eventually end up the same. Either literally worked until they die from sickness and exhaustion, killed while trying to escape, or killed for helping someone else. That's their future. Ashur himself tells you that he needs more slaves, because he is running through them so quickly. That is not the world created by a good man.

I will admit that Ashur's wife does not seem at all monstrous on the surface. Yet she is taking advantage of the suffering and death of untold numbers of her husband's victims so that she can live well and do her experiments. Apparently the mound of corpses she is living atop of does not disturb her in the slightest. Must be nice to not be bothered by a pesky thing like a conscience. Great person she is.

The bottom line is that you can make steel without enslaving people and working them to their literal deaths. You can create a community without putting people in chains and killing anyone who tries to escape your hellhole. Ashur created and perpetuated a nightmare not because it is the only option, but because he wanted to. He likes having mutilated corpses hanging up outside his fortress of solitude. You don't see that in places like Megaton or Rivet City. Not even in the Enclave. That is what he represents: death, plain and simple.

That's almost the same as the last thing Werhner says as he sees you across the bridge when you leave.

True. But you will note it is not because he is killing off all his people and hanging them up on hooks to create artwork.

Edit to add: To be honest, I cannot see why anyone would stay there afterward. You can find steel in the ruins of any city. In the ones in the north at least, foundries and other heavy industry are not that hard to find either. But I suppose if Bethesda just had all the slaves leave for freedom after parting the Red Sea Ohio River, there would be nothing for the player character to do there afterward. Not that there is much to do except use the ammo press and scav for leftover ingots in the scrapyard as it is. Just like the fires of Kvatch burn forever in Oblivion, Beth never did anything to show how the place would change afterward.

That's because its a long term change.

Also, I love how you claim that they could just move to the ruins of another city.. Have you been paying attention to the series. Chances are another city is going to have just as many problems as the pitt itself and its inhabitants are likely to be incredibly hostile. Plus its almost certain to be infested with Ferals, East Cost Mutants and various other raiding scumbags. This is ignoring how you just cut up and move a couple of thousand people out of a city, especially with the logistics that the have (ie none). People would end up dying of hunger, of exhaustion of dehydration and similar. Mutant Raider and wild beast attacks would also kill more, not to mention if any of the locals start shooting.

And even if they get to the city, they will still all be sterile.

I have seen what the other cities are like. You can see the sun in DC, rather than just a sheet of brown smoke. There is rough grass growing around places like Canterbury Commons and Bethesda, instead of being nothing but rubble. Meaning livestock like Brahmin can live there, and crops like mutfruit can grow there, unlike Pitt. There is no food in The Pitt, apparently they all eat rusted iron. There is no water either, except the rivers that glow with radiation and steam with toxic sludge. Realistically, they would all die of starvation and thirst if they stayed there. But Bethedsa never thinks of things like that.

True there are dangers in other cities, but those dangers are also present in the Pitt (except the Raiders, who at least all end up dead at the end, so you do have a point there). On the other hand, there is a much better chance of long-term survival somewhere similar to Canterbury Commons - a place with buildings, some industry, rubble to dig up scrap, and a living countryside - for the reasons stated above. Moving would not be easy, but not as hard as you present either. People who have nothing - like the slaves - do not have much to transport. Mainly just themselves and the rags they are wearing. They face the same issues of eating and drinking on the road as they do in the Pitt. Less really, as they might even scavenge something growing in the wild, and even catch a few wild Brahmin. Nothing grows in the Pitt, except radiation and waste. Fighting off raiders and critters like radscorpions and yaoi gai would be the big problem. But at least after killing Ashur's thugs, there would be plenty of guns to go around...

I am not sure what your point is about them being sterile in another city. How is that an issue somewhere else, but not in the Pitt? That does not change no matter where they go, if indeed they are sterile.