Into The Pitt

Into The Pitt is a quest $$ The quest starts with the Lone Wanderer being contacted by Wernher.

Investigate the distress call
When The Pitt first loads, the player character will be informed of a new radio distress signal", from a runaway slave named Wernher, who informs the Lone Wanderer that he needs help in retrieving a cure for the mutations plaguing the town developed by The Pitt's raider boss, and Ex-Brotherhood of Steel member, Ishmael Ashur.

The signal emanates from a radio tower far to the north of the Capital Wasteland. It is a long walk from anywhere, but the closest map marker to fast travel to is SatCom Array NN-03d. Once arriving at the tower, Wernher will be under attack by a few Pitt raiders. After helping him dispatch his foes, Wernher will tell the player character his story and that there is a train tunnel to the west where he will meet up with the player character and guide them into The Pitt.

Wernher suggests the player character obtain a disguise from the slavers camping outside the train tunnel to ease gaining access to The Pitt. Upon heading west, there is indeed a train tunnel, as well as a group of about four slavers led by a man named Ramsey and a couple of Pitt slaves in a locked slave pen. Be careful when approaching Ramsey if having previously been hostile with Paradise Falls. Though he will appear friendly, interacting with Ramsey will cause him to immediately recognize the Lone Wanderer as the one who "shot up Paradise Falls" and become hostile along with the other slavers nearby. Killing him costs no Karma.

Obtaining a slave outfit can either be accomplished by buying the slaves or killing the slavers; there are 2 slave outfits in the slave pen, one on a dead slave and one on Prosper which can be acquired by threatening him (giving negative Karma) or by telling him the player is freeing the slaves for no reward (Good Karma). Prosper tells the player character to take the dead slave's outfit. After entering the train tunnel, the player character must activate a hand cart to travel to The Pitt. Any companions will be left behind, returning to their respective hiring locations.

Arriving at the trainyard
Upon arrival at the train yard, Wernher will tell the player character to hang back while he "does the talking," and walks over to a Pitt raider standing guard. Werhner's diplomacy quickly becomes that of the shotgun variety, and the player character must intervene once again. The train yard has several Pitt raiders firing from elevated positions, so an accurate rifle is handy, or one can just let Wernher do the work.

After the firefight, Wernher will walk to the northeastern exit of the train yard and tell the player character that he cannot proceed any further. He will then tell the player character that the guards will confiscate the player character's inventory upon entering, and to find a slave named Midea. The player character can inquire about concealing a small weapon: Wernher will agree and hand over either a knife (a Switchblade), or a small gun (a .32 Pistol). Note that the player doesn't actually receive their weapon immediately; instead one gets a misc item that turns into the weapon upon entering Downtown.

After exiting the trainyard, the player should be wary of the gutted building on the left side of the path. There is a small group of hostile wildmen inside it. It is possible to sneak past the entire building, but if detected, the player will be caught in the open. North of the building is The Pitt bridge. The bridge is gridlocked with various vehicles from before the Great War, and riddled with Frag Mines, left by The Pitt's raiders to kill off anything trying to leave or enter The Pitt. Failing to disarm a mine and letting it detonate can catch the player in a huge chain reaction explosion. The player should cross the bridge carefully, It helps a lot to have the light step perk or use sneak mode to check for mines and avoid the eyes of a Pitt raider with a Sniper Rifle who is in a small, high up ledge near the end of the bridge. The ledge the sniper resides on is accessible from the ground by means of a gravity-defying ramp along the bridge's main cable. It is worth noting that the water in the river is irradiated to lethal levels, often in the hundreds of rads per second.

After finishing the harrowing trek, the player will reach a right-turn on a street. This is where a familiar scene from The Pitt trailer plays out: a few runaway slaves will run by, only to be blown to pieces by mines. This is a good place to get a slave outfit if one hasn't already. At the end of the road is a roadblock.

If the player decides to kill the gate guards (Mex and three other raiders), they will be incapacitated by four Pitt raiders with Police Batons upon entering Downtown. As the player's vision fades to black, the slavers squabble over the player's gear. If the player asked Wernher for a concealable weapon, they will receive it now.

If the player instead pretends to be a slave, Mex will believe that the Lone Wanderer is a slave who was unable to cross the bridge. He will confiscate all the player's gear (except the previously mentioned concealed weapon) and then tell the player to get back to work. The player is not attacked upon entering Downtown when taking this route.

The player can also tell Mex that they would like to become a Pitt raider, Mex lies to the player and tells them they are hiring. Upon entering one is incapacitated much like above.

Regardless of the method of entry (even using exploits to bypass the confiscation of items completely) the quest will be completed upon entering Downtown, leading directly into Unsafe Working Conditions.

Rewards

 * 150 XP

Keeping your items in The Pitt
The forced conversation with Mex (and the subsequent confiscation of your items) can be avoided when approaching the main gate. This is done by switching to unarmed combat, standing directly underneath the raider on the overhead catwalk, jumping and entering V.A.T.S. while in midair, then throwing a single punch; the punch will miss but will leave you on top of the catwalk, standing next to the raider. By quickly jumping down from the catwalk you can avoid the conversation trigger entirely. Be warned that if you do not jump down from the catwalk fast enough the trigger will activate and your controls will be locked, rendering you unable to move, and Mex will not be able to reach you to initiate the conversation, thus keeping you in this state indefinitely. (Note: this does not seem to be possible on the 360, but barrels laying around the bridge can be stacked on the baby carriage to achieve the same effect.)

If you are successful in avoiding the forced conversation you will be able to enter the Downtown area without being ambushed and losing your items. Fast travel to the Bridge and train yard will remain available. If you chose to have Wernher give you a concealed switchblade or .32 pistol it will remain as an un-droppable miscellaneous item. PC users can remove the items by using the commands or  for the switchblade and pistol, respectively.

Once this exploit is used, passing through the main gates where the conversation is triggered must be avoided at all costs. Doing so will lock your controls indefinitely, as the conversation options which would unlock them are no longer available once you have completed the quest. (Note: Once inside Downtown you can fast travel to the bridge, re-cross it, re-disarm all the mines, and kill Mex (don't get close enough to him to trigger the event) and the other Pitt raiders for their Infiltrators if you do this you cannot get through the door until the main quests are completed. Just simply fast travel back into Downtown.)

Another technique using fast travel (easy and recommended): Don't kill the guards or Mex, drag the body of one of the slaves killed by frag mines across the first gate and use it as a container to store all of your items. Go through the gate (to Downtown) then immediately back through the gate (to the Pitt) and pick up your items. Next, fast travel into Downtown and you will have all your items. If you bring your items when entering Downtown, all your items will disappear from your inventory. Killing the guards at the gate then entering Downtown will result in you getting knocked to ground by guards from the Downtown part. You cannot prevent this because your controls are blocked upon entering. So just don't kill them. Note: It can happen that it will take some time for the quest "Into The Pitt" to complete. Walk around in the Downtown section for a minute then go back to the gate and wait a few seconds and then go looking for Midea. Quest will be completed shortly.

Behind the scenes
When asking Prosper for his clothes, the Lone Wanderer says, "I need your clothes. Give them to me. Now." This is a reference to The Terminator, in which Arnold Schwarzenegger appears in the past completely naked and confronts three street punks.

Bugs

 * If you choose to use a slave disguise, have it in your inventory, but don't put it on by the time you cross the bridge and one of the raiders says that 'one of the slaves came back', the game will freeze.
 * The radio signal which starts this quest may not appear. This can be fixed by using the command.
 * The dead slave body may not appear at the beginning of Into The Pitt and thus, in order to continue, you will have to get the clothes off Prosper. This can sometimes be fixed by exiting the game and reloading again.
 * The dead slave body will still blink, as though he is still alive. He will stop blinking once the slave outfit is removed from his body.
 * Once the player releases the slaves in the cage, you can keep talking to the Prosper (be sure not to demand his clothing in any of the dialogue) for infinite Good Karma.
 * Once Wernher has killed the first Pitt raider after arriving at The Pitt, he may still continue to fire at the dead body of that Pitt raider, even after all the other raiders are dead. This can be fixed by the player character shooting the dead body themselves.
 * The footlocker and three ammo boxes in the slaver camp get disabled after the player enters the Pitt. If you store the bulk of your inventory there beforehand, all their contents will disappear along with them.
 * These containers can be selected in the console with to temporarily  and  them.
 * In unpatched versions of the Xbox version of the game, if you find the train station BEFORE talking to Wernher and save in front of Ramsey your game can freeze, causing you to have to backtrack to an earlier save in order to continue.