Is Odyn evil?

[yetgdhfgh]

i'm in doubt about Odyn, but you should never trust friendly old man with a beard

Even if that beard is on fire?

[Deleted]

Even if that beard is on fire?

especially then
his beard grows faster then it burns, can only be evil

[Magnagarde]

More like chaotic neutral. I do not think that chaotic good characters tend to send assasins after someones realtives on the offchance that some prophesy may come true and one of them turns to evil. And that, if we are talking about D&D setting, is the most dangerous and volatile combination of all. Rorschach from the Watchers comes to mind as a prime example.

The reason why I class him as chaotic good is because he himself was created by the gods of the known universe. To put in perspective, those that shaped everything and anything that wasn't according to their plan placed him into the position he is in and there is no doubt he still holds firm to his purpose - that he is their herald on Azeroth. That being said, he doesn't look at some fel-infused Vrykul daughter of the traitorous Skovald as something he needs to protect or even have any sympathy for; his only purpose is to protect Azeroth and the death of a fel-infused Vrykul is always a good thing if you are thinking about Azeroth's well-being. He was not created by the gods/titans to have sympathy, but to do what is best for Azeroth overall.

Mortal standards over what is necessary and what is good are not on parr with the ones of the titans and their creations. For instance, Algalon was ready to reset all life on Azeroth in accord with the titans' instructions simply because life didn't go as they had planned. The titans didn't have any evil intentions when implementing such a safeguarding system. If they were ready to extinguish all life on Azeroth and put a reset to it, what concern would a fel-infused Vrykul cause? None. All of this doesn't mean the titans and their creations that carry out instructions are evil; they're in the spectrum of good, but this lack of concern over what they'll have to do in order to get through with their plan(the ultimate goal of the plan being to create good) puts them into the chaotic good bar to me.

[Qualia]

Ehm... numerous demon hunters turning to Legion is considered protecting Azeroth now? How is that different from Skovald's family? This is one of the most hypicritical narratives on Blizzard's part, when it comes to Odyn. Demon hunters, with fel corrupted bodies and souls - good. Despite the fact that a number of them willingly joined Legion and others were "decieved" to join. Nightbourne - good, despite the fact that their leader Elisande was a very strong ally to the Legion (the number of rebels was minor compared to those that supported, or at the very least not opposed her). Yet, Skovald's family is bad and deserve to be killed. All and each of them for the same exact reason of affiliation by proximity and Collective Punishment. All done in the off chance that some prophecy about Skovald's bloodline would be true and one of them would become Odyn's enemy. By the same logic he should just wipe all Draenei and Orcs from existance. Velen in particular, as he is one of the more powerful characters in the game right now and is extremely unstable due to death of his son (legion general by the way), who was killed in the Exodar invasion by players. Same goes for Illidan. I hope I am not the only one seeing how ends do not meet here. Siding with Odyn defies logic. That, and him being based on a god of trickery in the northern mythology is worrysome at best.

Why are you addressing DH as a whole instead of those on our side? Pretty sure both us and Odyn would have no issue with putting down the DHs on the Legion side - and we did. Only the one on our side get the pass. We (including Odyn) don't judge someone based on who he / she is, but what he / she does. As I said, if you missed that somehow, Skovald's family was NOT killed because they carried the Fel taint, not even just because they are affiliated with Skovald, but because one of them would become the enemy of Azeroth. Prophecy is a thing in WoW because some people have proven that the ability to see future is real, so that wasn't just "some off chance". It was at worst a very realistic possibility and at best, something that bound to happen (depends on whether the one who made the prophecy had Velen's future sight or the Bronze Dragonflight's). Odyn didn't know which one would turn against Azeroth, so the easy solution would be to just wipe them out so there wouldn't be anyone left to threaten the planet.

On the other hand, the DH on our side didn't join the Legion and is actually fighting against them with us, that's why they are on our side protecting Azeroth. They aren't accepted because they are Demon Hunter, they are accepted because they are fighting the same enemy with us and they - the one that joined - haven't done anything harmful to us in this war yet. It's a simple matter, really - if you are on our side, you are good; if you are our enemy, you will die (or at least get beaten until you switch to our side); Just look at it, we have a Nathrezim (Dreadlord) being a general of the Army of the Light. If we discriminate beings for what they are, that would never happen. If Helya didn't act like she did and provided good support for us, things might never went the way they did for her.

Lastly, the Skovald's family's case did NOT happen because of their affiliation by proximity. They weren't killed just because they were affiliated with Skovald. They were killed because they carried the bloodline that was prophesied to become the enemy of Azeroth, and it just happened to be Skovald's bloodline. Those seem to be similar, but they are two different things. If the prophecy didn't mention Skovald bloodline, but another X guy, then that X guy's family will be exterminated instead even if X might not carry any kind of Fel taint. Can you see the difference now? There isn't any prophecy or indication that the Draenei, the Orc, or the DH will betray us and become enemy of Azeroth, so there isn't any reason for Odyn to be against them. Now, it'd be right if you are to argue that, in the same line, he *might* turn against us in the future if there is some prediction that we'd become enemy of Azeroth somehow. However, as I said, that's the future. We can't afford to care about the future at the moment, all we can care about is now. If that future happens, then he'd become our enemy and we'd beat him down. If not, then we continue living happily forever.

[Gaaz]

The reason why I class him as chaotic good is because he himself was created by the gods of the known universe. To put in perspective, those that shaped everything and anything that wasn't according to their plan placed him into the position he is in and there is no doubt he still holds firm to his purpose - that he is their herald on Azeroth. That being said, he doesn't look at some fel-infused Vrykul daughter of the traitorous Skovald as something he needs to protect or even have any sympathy for; his only purpose is to protect Azeroth and the death of a fel-infused Vrykul is always a good thing if you are thinking about Azeroth's well-being. He was not created by the gods/titans to have sympathy, but to do what is best for Azeroth overall.

Mortal standards over what is necessary and what is good are not on parr with the ones of the titans and their creations. For instance, Algalon was ready to reset all life on Azeroth in accord with the titans' instructions simply because life didn't go as they had planned. The titans didn't have any evil intentions when implementing such a safeguarding system. If they were ready to extinguish all life on Azeroth and put a reset to it, what concern would a fel-infused Vrykul cause? None. All of this doesn't mean the titans and their creations that carry out instructions are evil; they're in the spectrum of good, but this lack of concern over what they'll have to do in order to get through with their plan(the ultimate goal of the plan being to create good) puts them into the chaotic good bar to me.

Willingness of Titans to reset all life in Azeroth automatically excludes someone from being on the good spectrum. It does not necessarily mean they are evil, but definitely not good. Same goes for Odyn. He is definitely chaotic as his actions defy all logic and common sense. And imo assasination attempts of his rivals due to vague leads also excludes him from being good. Hell, he amuses himself by watching his followers kill each other during trials, lies, tricks people into doing work for him, raises undead (say hello to the Lich King, he also raised undead to protect Azeroth from Legion). I would not consider him good at all. Being fel infused is not an excuse for murder - there are plenty of characters in game that he considers Allies and are fel infused.
As for Algalon - he was true neutral. He did not care either way. Probably the same goes for Titans as a whole.

Why are you addressing DH as a whole instead of those on our side? Pretty sure both us and Odyn would have no issue with putting down the DHs on the Legion side - and we did. Only the one on our side get the pass. We (including Odyn) don't judge someone based on who he / she is, but what he / she does. As I said, if you missed that somehow, Skovald's family was NOT killed because they carried the Fel taint, not even just because they are affiliated with Skovald, but because one of them would become the enemy of Azeroth. Prophecy is a thing in WoW because some people have proven that the ability to see future is real, so that wasn't just "some off chance". It was at worst a very realistic possibility and at best, something that bound to happen (depends on whether the one who made the prophecy had Velen's future sight or the Bronze Dragonflight's). Odyn didn't know which one would turn against Azeroth, so the easy solution would be to just wipe them out so there wouldn't be anyone left to threaten the planet.

On the other hand, the DH on our side didn't join the Legion and is actually fighting against them with us, that's why they are on our side protecting Azeroth. They aren't accepted because they are Demon Hunter, they are accepted because they are fighting the same enemy with us and they - the one that joined - haven't done anything harmful to us in this war yet. It's a simple matter, really - if you are on our side, you are good; if you are our enemy, you will die (or at least get beaten until you switch to our side); Just look at it, we have a Nathrezim (Dreadlord) being a general of the Army of the Light. If we discriminate beings for what they are, that would never happen. If Helya didn't act like she did and provided good support for us, things might never went the way they did for her.

Lastly, the Skovald's family's case did NOT happen because of their affiliation by proximity. They weren't killed just because they were affiliated with Skovald. They were killed because they carried the bloodline that was prophesied to become the enemy of Azeroth, and it just happened to be Skovald's bloodline. Those seem to be similar, but they are two different things. If the prophecy didn't mention Skovald bloodline, but another X guy, then that X guy's family will be exterminated instead even if X might not carry any kind of Fel taint. Can you see the difference now? There isn't any prophecy or indication that the Draenei, the Orc, or the DH will betray us and become enemy of Azeroth, so there isn't any reason for Odyn to be against them. Now, it'd be right if you are to argue that, in the same line, he *might* turn against us in the future if there is some prediction that we'd become enemy of Azeroth somehow. However, as I said, that's the future. We can't afford to care about the future at the moment, all we can care about is now. If that future happens, then he'd become our enemy and we'd beat him down. If not, then we continue living happily forever.

Come on... I would say that close to a half of Legion's forces encountered to this day were orcs. Many of them were draenei. Affiliation by proximity actually includes all orcs, draenei and Velen himself, just like it included Scovald's family. It literally means affiliated because they were close. I simply can not believe that there are no prophecies that imply that another orc / draenei / human, singular or en masse, is giong to become an enemy to Odyn and join Legion. We already have a constant stream of traitors, converts and all sorts of cultists (old gods, Legion, etc.). Killing all members of the family just in case ONE of them MIGHT become an enemy to Odyn due to a prophesy (which is in no way a 100% certain as we know of scores of prophecies about Legion, LK etc. that did not come true previously)seems not only extreme, it also lacks logic. Velen is a brother to 2 leaders of the Legion. How is he not a target? Illidan almost becomes a vessel for Sargeras's resurection. How is he not a target? Especially considering that he was a part of Legion once, and due to corruption can easily become again. Lets make a real life analogy:
- Someone was working with ISIS. You know that, yet you allow him to stroll all over your house and decide it would be wise to see if a random stranger can kill him or not. And you plan to give a gun to the winner.
- You then send assasins after this guy's family and try to kill his wife and kids, because someone from intelligence (which sometimes is as accurate as a coin toss) told you that one of his children MIGHT be affiliated with ISIS as well in the future.
- All that while you pat on the back a brother of 2 leaders of ISIS, saying he is a hell of a chap. Fully aware that this chap was holed at home while your forces were battling ISIS on the front lines, and that your allies killed his only son.
As for DHs, there seems to be a constant stream of those that join Legion: Lysanis, Cailyn, Nightglave, Illysana, Tirathon, Glayvianna, Jade to name but a few. Yet, for some reason Odyn is not bothered at all. Illidan himself is a former member. That is insane at the very least.

[MikeBogina]

Betraying Helya and killing her and turning her into a fallen Val'kyr, deeming the dragon aspects incompetent, trying to kill Skovald entire family in cold blood all the while talking about valor.

Why do warriors follow him again?

He makes the hard choices that no one else wants to make. Choices that would benefit the world greatly if others would just fall in line. Look at Arthas, his decision at Stratholme was the right choice, but Jaina and Uther turning their backs on him caused him to become darker and have this feeling of "I'm the only one who can do this" mentality, that Odyn also has.

[Verdugo]

He makes the hard choices that no one else wants to make. Choices that would benefit the world greatly if others would just fall in line. Look at Arthas, his decision at Stratholme was the right choice, but Jaina and Uther turning their backs on him caused him to become darker and have this feeling of "I'm the only one who can do this" mentality, that Odyn also has.

Why does this remind me of something.

[Mehrunes]

There isn't anything random with Odyn's action. It's not like he turned Helya into a Val'kyr on a whim. He did that for his plan to create the Valarjar to protect Azeroth. He had a specific purpose and knew how to do it. Additionally, as discussed before, assassination - which I assume you are referring to Skovald's family - has nothing to do with "valor" that Odyn is obsessed with. Valor, as a concept, means (as per dictionaries) having courage in battle or in face of great danger. Any action outside of a battle, a war, or while not being in danger does NOT make you more or less valorous. That's why you have warriors / soldiers in real life who are considered valorous and yet act like jerks outside of war (someone brought the Vikings up, I think that's a good example). Odyn didn't order the death of Skovald's family because he was in danger, neither did he do that because they were in a war with each other. He was just doing what our secret service agents do - remove the threat of the nation (well, in his case, the world). In other words, "valor" has nothing to do there. The act didn't make Odyn less (or more) valorous.

You're still going with this narrative? The entire point of the prophecy was about Skovald's family posing great danger. Killing them off was to prevent that danger from materializing. "In face of great danger" does not necessitate being in danger at the exact time you are performing actions in regards to it or even for it to be directly personal. Covert assassination, especially when you're infinitely more powerful than the beings you want dead, is the opposite of courage. Hell, you're also ignoring other, more general dictionary definitions of valor like "personal bravery" or "heroic courage". Where assassination sticks out even more. Not sure what being a jerk has to do with it, but I'll write it up to a weak-ass attempt at a deflection.

[Qualia]

You're still going with this narrative? The entire point of the prophecy was about Skovald's family posing great danger. Killing them off was to prevent that danger from materializing. "In face of great danger" does not necessitate being in danger at the exact time you are performing actions in regards to it or even for it to be directly personal. Covert assassination, especially when you're infinitely more powerful than the beings you want dead, is the opposite of courage. Hell, you're also ignoring other, more general dictionary definitions of valor like "personal bravery" or "heroic courage". Where assassination sticks out even more. Not sure what being a jerk has to do with it, but I'll write it up to a weak-ass attempt at a deflection.

I'm still going with it because it is the correct narrative. Yes, the point of the prophecy was about Skovald's family posing great danger, to Azeroth that is. I don't want to be grammar police, but I'd like to remind you that the part "in the face of" means you are facing that danger (definition being "when confronted / threatened with"), so of course it need to be at the same time you are performing the action(s). Additionally, if you are being confronted with the danger, then it should affect you. At the point of the assassination, there wasn't any danger to Odyn to face against. Moreover, "Valor" and "courage" has similar meaning (that's why they are synonyms), but they don't have the same meaning. Valor is courage applying in certain circumstances (in face of danger, in defense of noble cause, in battle / war).

I was bringing the cases of soldiers in real life considered valorous and yet act like jerks outside of war not as a deflection, but as an example in real life to make it easier to get my point (i.e: Vikings, marines, soldiers) because the their "jerk" side didn't involve too many courageous actions: raping, bullying the weak, pillaging, etc. If your definition of valor is correct, secret services agents would never get awarded Medal of Valor (some of their works behind the scenes which was exactly what you said, "covert assassination"). The Vikings would never be considered valorous warriors (raping and pillaging the defeated), neither are a number of famous warrior in China's Warring States Period. The list goes on. Yet, we know all of those happened in occasions, so either the countries are ignorant of the meaning of valor, or your definition is slightly off. It might (or might not) be a case of bandwagoning, but I'd rather trust the world at large (or the one who are at a high enough position to award others official medals, in case of nowadays people) and assume that all the bad things I listed didn't affect the... uhh, valorous status (sounds pretty weird, I know) as they don't fall into situations in which the concept of "valor" can be applied.

Come on... I would say that close to a half of Legion's forces encountered to this day were orcs. Many of them were draenei. Affiliation by proximity actually includes all orcs, draenei and Velen himself, just like it included Scovald's family. It literally means affiliated because they were close. I simply can not believe that there are no prophecies that imply that another orc / draenei / human, singular or en masse, is giong to become an enemy to Odyn and join Legion. We already have a constant stream of traitors, converts and all sorts of cultists (old gods, Legion, etc.). Killing all members of the family just in case ONE of them MIGHT become an enemy to Odyn due to a prophesy (which is in no way a 100% certain as we know of scores of prophecies about Legion, LK etc. that did not come true previously)seems not only extreme, it also lacks logic.

My point was that the Skovald family was NOT killed because they were close to Skovald. In fact, Skovald himself has very little to do with it. That's why I said it wasn't a case of affiliation by proximity. They were killed because one of them would turn into foe and thus, become an enemy of Azeroth - it's just so happen that they carry Skovald's blood. If it was a prophecy about Ingvar's bloodline, for example, then Ingvar's family (not the Plunderer one) would have been killed instead even when Ingvar himself was a Valarjar and carried no Fel whatsoever in his blood. Actually, Odyn seldomly take actions against people because of affiliation by proximity - feel free to bring up examples if I missed them.

In regards to the prophecies, we have never seen any prophecy about the Orc, the Draenei or the DH betraying us. The chance that the one with us now, will betray us in the future might be anything between 0 and 100 with 0 being a realistic possibility. Without a prophecy, one can't be certain if they will betray us, and we don't have a prophecy about them. Why would that be hard to believe? Prophecies aren't made daily (and no, the ones the cultists spout aren't confirmed to be prophecy instead of just bs). We've only encountered a very small number of prophecy, after all, and WoW has 15+ thousand years of history. I agree that is it extreme that Odyn acted against Skovald's family upon a prophecy that only might happen, though, but I'd say that it's not without logic. He had a realistic, confirmed chance of that happening at very least and a 100% chance of that happening at best, so he remove them to make it a 0% chance. We can't say that the prophecy wasn't 100% certain since we don't know which kind of prophecy it was. There are two types of future-sight in WoW so far in lore, confirmed by characters / Bllizard - the possible future type (i.e: Velen) and the perfectly correct type - assuming no one mess with the timeline (i.e: the Bronze Dragonflight, and Xe'ra if she wasn't just lying). The prophecy might have been made by someone with the later type of vision.

Mind you, even though Odyn's action was extreme, it isn't too far off. We in real life practice something similar in form of culling a herd of animals when one or two of them were found affiliated with disease. There isn't any prophecy involved, but the basis is the same: there is a good chance that some of them might turn out bad and threaten more than just themselves or their family. We don't want to (or can't?) spend time to find out - better not leave thing to chance and just burn them all.

Willingness of Titans to reset all life in Azeroth automatically excludes someone from being on the good spectrum. It does not necessarily mean they are evil, but definitely not good. Same goes for Odyn. He is definitely chaotic as his actions defy all logic and common sense. And imo assasination attempts of his rivals due to vague leads also excludes him from being good. Hell, he amuses himself by watching his followers kill each other during trials, lies, tricks people into doing work for him, raises undead (say hello to the Lich King, he also raised undead to protect Azeroth from Legion). I would not consider him good at all. Being fel infused is not an excuse for murder - there are plenty of characters in game that he considers Allies and are fel infused.
As for Algalon - he was true neutral. He did not care either way. Probably the same goes for Titans as a whole.

Willingness to reset all lives doesn't automatically remove one from being in the good spectrum, though. The intentions matter, especially when resetting all those lives might not even be considered a non-good action in their standards. Just look at the article for Chaotic Good - at first glance, Odyn might fit quite nicely in the "Goodness before Freedom" category here: "They desire to do good, but also feel that they have a responsibility to do good, and view freedom as a secondary (but still important) concern" and "They are not opposed to the Lawful system and may even accept it as necessary or even good, but they will rarely, if ever, let it get in the way of doing what they feel is right, sometimes making them a heroic example of The Unfettered. However, this means they risk trampling on the rights and freedom of others and may push them into Well-Intentioned Extremist territory if they are not careful."

[MikeBogina]

Why does this remind me of something.

I played that game for about a couple hrs, but never got far to know any of the characters. But from that dialogue, it seems like his plan failed more to his oversight on the rats and not that of people supporting his ideas.

If we look at what Odyn had planned, if Helya went along with him, despite how morally wrong it is, he would never have been imprisoned and he'd have an army of these empowered Titanforged who would smack down any Legion threat or other. At the cost of some freedoms, of some liberties, Azeroth would not be in the current situation.

For instance, in the Injustice comic, Superman cracks down on dictators calls for cease fires of all conflicts after Joker killed millions of people with a nuke. Immediately batman and the US government turn on him and go after his family and friends. If Batman and the others complied, their earth would be a paradise(like it is in the future), but because of the constant attempts on superman, it turned into a dictatorship.

[Cwimge]

Reminder that the way odin words it sounds as though, had skovold arrived a little sooner. He would have at the very least entertained the idea of giving the aegis to him instead of us.

[Aeluron Lightsong]

I played that game for about a couple hrs, but never got far to know any of the characters. But from that dialogue, it seems like his plan failed more to his oversight on the rats and not that of people supporting his ideas.

If we look at what Odyn had planned, if Helya went along with him, despite how morally wrong it is, he would never have been imprisoned and he'd have an army of these empowered Titanforged who would smack down any Legion threat or other. At the cost of some freedoms, of some liberties, Azeroth would not be in the current situation.

For instance, in the Injustice comic, Superman cracks down on dictators calls for cease fires of all conflicts after Joker killed millions of people with a nuke. Immediately batman and the US government turn on him and go after his family and friends. If Batman and the others complied, their earth would be a paradise(like it is in the future), but because of the constant attempts on superman, it turned into a dictatorship.

Thing is Superman wasn't doing it for Justice, he was pissed because he lost his wife and future son. Moreover it's not Helya's fault that she rejected Odin's whole big dream of valor and what not. Odin's a dick.

[Arrashi]

I played that game for about a couple hrs, but never got far to know any of the characters. But from that dialogue, it seems like his plan failed more to his oversight on the rats and not that of people supporting his ideas.

If we look at what Odyn had planned, if Helya went along with him, despite how morally wrong it is, he would never have been imprisoned and he'd have an army of these empowered Titanforged who would smack down any Legion threat or other. At the cost of some freedoms, of some liberties, Azeroth would not be in the current situation.

For instance, in the Injustice comic, Superman cracks down on dictators calls for cease fires of all conflicts after Joker killed millions of people with a nuke. Immediately batman and the US government turn on him and go after his family and friends. If Batman and the others complied, their earth would be a paradise(like it is in the future), but because of the constant attempts on superman, it turned into a dictatorship.

Remember kids - genocide is ALWAYS a valid solution. Regardless of problem you face.

[Wilfire]

Don't apply modern morality to Warcraft. The stakes are insanely high - should Odyn fail to protect Azeroth, either the Void will consume everyone and everything or Sargeras will succeed in his crusade and wipe out all life. In a situation like this the only valid course of action is immediate and forceful removal of any threat to Azeroth. We've seen expansion after expansion that diplomacy doesn't work in Warcraft like it does in real life, the only valid course of action to resolve a conflict is to defeat the enemy in a military confrontation.

Moreover, Odyn isn't even an actual flesh and blood being, he is just a very advanced A.I. left behind by the Titans - the same goes for Helya. What should Odyn have done when a subservient A.I. started glitching like mad and jeopardizing Azeroth?

[Camthur]

He's definitely not a good guy. His actions may align with those of good people from time to time, but he's definitely selfish and seems to care mainly about his own desires and goals. (and this is coming from a guy with a warrior main) It's all about perspective I suppose. You can bet that Sigryn thinks he's the blackest evil to set foot on Azeroth.

[Razion]

At the very least he didn't have nice things to say about Naga during a world quest.
Would be kind of awkward if a player character would happen to be using a Naga costume during that world quest..

[Protean]

First of all: http://wow.gamepedia.com/Helya

"He told the vrykul that those who died a worthy death in battle would have their spirits brought to the Halls and given new bodies to fight as his Valarjar, which Odyn thought would be better defenders than the dragons. In order to retrieve the spirits of the deceased, Odyn would need vrykul to volunteer to become undead and take those spirits from the Shadowlands. The vrykul objected, and Helya tried to talk him out of it. Instead, Odyn transformed Helya into the first Val'kyr and ordered her to do the job for him.
Helya nursed resentment against Odyn for thousands of years, until the day Loken, a Keeper who had been influenced by Yogg-Saron, convinced her to turn against him. Helya used the same magic that had been used to lock the Elemental Plane to seal Odyn and his Valarjar army inside the Halls of Valor, and then decided herself to become the caretaker of vrykul souls in her new realm Helheim.[8]"

Odyn is NOT evil. He, as all gods or demi-gods, like to do whatever the fuck they like.
Basically, Odyn didn't agree with the decision of the Pantheon and he wanted to build an army for himself to defend Azeroth.
He forced his adopted daughter Helya to become the guide of fallen souls. Not much different from a parent forcing his child to become a doctor.

As we have seen, the dragon aspects were / are in fact, incompetent.

Warriors follow him, cause he provides them with unending feasts, hunting grounds and eternal battles and only the best of the best get to hang with him.

In old times it was common practice that the families of traitors were disgraced or murdered.
It was to prevent revenge or corruption and to set an example.

Specifically, to prevent a blood feud by starting a blood feud and ending it before they could counter it.

[Deleted]

Odyn tried to have the family killed yes, but they have all fed on Fel.

Exactly. Can we end the discussion yet? Odin killed some people because he was aware of something that the players didn't knew. If Helya didn't disobey we could have crushed the Legion etc.
Amazing how this Illidan story haven't thought players anything about stuff we don't understand - greater meaning and all. Same goes for "stuff we didn't knew".

Stuff that isn't handed on a silver plate makes people assume alot of stuff, and starts saying stupid things like "omg Odyn is EVUUUIL!".
jumping to conclusions is often a bad idea.

[Protean]

Just like evil people, right?

No. If I did whatever the fuck I wanted, and all I ever wanted was to help people, you wouldn't call it evil.

The actual act of doing what you want has no relation to good/evil. All that matters is the intention and the outcome.

[Deleted]

There is no simple good and evil, and WoW does not have that either. Sometimes gruesome things have to be done to accomplish a greater good.
Even the Naaru, probably the "most good" things in WoW, support Illidan, who did horrible things to many, to get stronger - which in turn he did to protect the others (and also his Tyrande).

What Odyn did, was always for what he thought has to be done to protect Azeroth. That aside, he is pretty powerful and a great ally against the Legion.