Ishmael Ashur

Ashur is the leader of The Pitt, a raider and slaver town. He is said to have found a cure for mutations. He is first formally introduced during the quest Unsafe Working Conditions, right before the Lone Wanderer goes to fight in The Hole. Ashur can later be met in person after the Lone Wanderer has fought his/her way through The Hole. The meeting is organized by Werhner and Midea to get the Lone Wanderer closer to the cure.

After the Scourge
In a series of holotapes found in his personal safe, he talks to his daughter Marie about the history of The Pitt. Ashur reveals he was a member of the Brotherhood of Steel, and participated in their assault on the Pitt twenty years ago, known as the Scourge. During the fight, Ashur was caught in an explosion and was presumed dead, so the Brotherhood left him within the mill. After being pulled out of the rubble by scavengers trying to steal his armor, Ashur impresses them, some even considering him a god (Some Pitt raiders call him "Lord Ashur" and Midea sarcastically calls him the "God-King"). He then brought together the scavengers in the area, starting the city.

He chose to start the city in The Pitt because he was touched by the tenacious locals, and the fact that it contained the only operational steel mill the Brotherhood had ever run into. So he recruited everyone in the area, killed raider leaders and made the rest follow him. When that wasn't enough, he resorted to using slaves (who he insists on calling "workers"); he admits he hates to do this, but claims "it has to be done" since citizens of The Pitt are unable to have children due to mutation. His ultimate goal is to create the first city that is "producing" once again, since every other post-War community has lived off leftovers and was unable to create things anew.

Even the Enclave has lacked the ability to re-industrialize, due in part to their bigoted views of waste landers as mutants to be exterminated, when in reality they are a valuable work force. The Pitt is achieving what the Brotherhood of Steel won't, or as Ashur says was "too lazy" to, which is to rebuild factories. This makes Ashur likely one of the most powerful leaders in the Northeast. The ability to pump out weapons and ammo from factories, even if it is only one, is a huge advantage over having to scrounge for it or relying on pre-war stockpiles, as the Brotherhood and Enclave do.

Inconsistencies
Obviously, the above is false in the context of previous entries in the Fallout series, but only if Ashur's statements are taken to include the entirety of former United States' territory. Eighty years after the war, on the West Coast, the Brotherhood of Steel already had the ability to machine weapons, ammunition and replicate technology (although not as advanced as the power armor) on a scale large enough to serve as their primary source of income to buy food and water from the Hub, which in turn was a city which was the primary source of food and water for the region, buying most of the technology from other communities. Furthermore, Adytum was a major supplier of ammunition for the region, in addition to the Boneyard Gun Runners manufacturing weapons. These sentiments make even less sense in the context of Fallout 2, where the Enclave operates a freshly built military base at Navarro, clearly has the ability to manufacture energy weapons (to sell to the Salvatores) and is an obvious industrial powerhouse, and its ability to develop and mass-produce the Advanced Power Armor, a post-war technology. The New California Republic and Vault City are other examples of growing West Coast industrial centers, since both have redeveloped industry and can manufacture weapons on a large scale. Considering the setting of Fallout 3 in the isolated Eastern U.S. which has had little or no contact with the Western regions, Ashur is more likely referring only to the East Coast and its lack of progress in rebuilding civilization compared to the West. He may have been too young when he set out on the Brotherhood of Steel's expedition to Washington, D.C. to know about the West's growing industrial strength, and so would have no reason to think that The Pitt wasn't the sole redeveloping industrial center on the continent. In fact, in his speech to the slaves of The Pitt prior to the opening of the arena for combat, Ashur only compares The Pitt to eastern centers of civilization, including the Commonwealth, the Capital Wasteland, and Ronto, further supporting his own ignorance of the superior capabilities of western regions like the NCR.

Also, considering Bethesda's evolution of the canon of the series, it is quite possible that the "lack of contact" which the Brotherhood and Outcasts describe with the west coast is actually an indication of the situation in the west, namely the possibility of a descent into chaos and armed conflicts, thereby neutralizing any production capabilities the west coast might previously have enjoyed.

Character
Much like his nemesis Werhner, he cannot be judged as simply "good" or "evil". You do receive negative karma if you side with him and kill him, but there is no karma impact if you side against him and kill him. He often makes sacrifices that he claims "have to be done" like buying slaves to work in the steel mill or experiments on his daughter Marie. Although he uses slave labor, he intends to free the slaves once his city's population is able to reproduce again. This implies that once a cure is found, he will administer it to the slaves as well.

Ashur's daughter
The citizens in The Pitt are not sterile (unlike Ghouls or Super Mutants), but because the area is so heavily radiated, children are almost always born horribly mutated and change into Trogs just a few weeks after birth. Ashur's daughter Marie is unique, since she was apparently born with no mutations at all... not even a sixth toe! Marie can't be more than a few months old, since she's still very small and unable to talk, walk, or crawl.

While Marie's parents do not seem to share her total immunity, it is worth noting that Sandra does not have the skin lesions seen on many other Pitt Raiders, and despite twenty years in the Pitt, Ashur also appears to be healthy (if somewhat dirty and sunburned).

Bugs

 * If you shoot Ashur with a Mesmetron He will stand up and fire at his guards. If the guards sucessfully kill Ashur they will not become hostile towards you and act as if nothing happened.


 * Sometimes when you kill Ashur, Pitt Raiders will not become hostile towards you except for the ones in the area you killed Ashur. Also Sandra will still become hostile towards you.


 * Sometimes after the initial meeting dialog with Ashur he will repeat the words "Don't let me keep you" a few times to forever before leaving. This appears to be a bug, supposedly caused by speaking to others in Haven before speaking to Ashur or by skipping through too much of Ashur's dialog.


 * Ashur will sometimes fall down (exactly like Harkness if you turn him into Zimmer) at random moments. You can also loot while he is in this state and guards will not be hostile when gets back up.

Appearances
Ashur appears in The Pitt DLC pack for Fallout 3.