Quote Originally Posted by Roland Itiative View Post
That can get a little messy. We know for sure the oracle DOES prepare in advance for things he foresees (both making his land officially a city just to punish Belkar, and paying in advance for a resurrection). So either he can somewhat manipulate the outcome, or he already foresees the actions he would take if he could hypothetically see what would happen without said foresight (which is kinda brain-twisty).

In both cases, him avoiding Xykon because he knows Xykon would make him suffer in a fashion there's no recovery from makes sense. He either saw he would avoid Xykon to save his own behind, and followed the "script", or he saw Xykon imprisoning his soul/making him into a zombie/whatever, and acted to change that future.
On the bolded part: We see him trying (in a futile way, but trying nonetheless) to keep Belkar from killing him, only to be killed anyway ("Yeah, I wasn't really buying those theories either...worth a shot, though."). So I don't think the Oracle is capable of manipulating outcomes.

Comic for reference: http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0567.html