You wake up in the MCU (RAR, spoilers for Infinity War).

[The Romulan Republic]

One morning, that meddling bastard Q decides to have some fun with you. A finger-snap later, and you wake up in the MCU, circa 2008. One of the first things you hear on the news is that one Tony Stark has gone missing in Afghanistan, following a terrorist attack.

So, you are now an unpowered denizen of a superhero universe. Congratulations, and condolences.

You do have one "power"- foreknowledge. You know who all the major players are, you know about a number of plots that are already in motion. You also know that in approximately ten years, some big purple asshole is going to wipe out half the people in the universe unless the timeline substantially changes. Of course, your being there will have already subtly changed things, and those changes will lead to other changes, but there is absolutely no guarantee that those changes will be for the better.

Oh, Q also gives you another fun bit of information- every time you die, the timeline will reset to your arrival in the MCU, until you hit a timeline where Thanos fails to gain the Infinity Stones. Have fun.

What do you do?

[Elheru Aran]

*shrugs* There's not a whole lot I can do apart from making some bets at Vegas. I could start spamming SHIELD, if I can even find them, with billets-doux detailing what's going to happen in the near future. Am I going to be able to get near Tony Stark, billionaire playboy? Are people going to have the patience to wait around and see whether I was right about Captain America being found in the Arctic ice? Are the Wakandans going to be pleased if I start spreading stories about how they have a mountain of vibranium?

Realistically: the only thing I could honestly do is be prepared. Don't go to New York City shortly after they find Captain America. Stay away from Sovokia. Stay the hell away from wherever Bruce Banner is. Count the days until the finger-snap and gamble on whether I'm going to still be around.

[Tribble]

Ya, there's not much you can do in that scenario except stay the hell away from the fighting. There's no real way for you to influence events, and if you do somehow manage to cause enough ruckus to get noticed, you'll probably end up taken out one way or another.

Fortunately I don't live in New York City, Wakanda or Sovokia, so odds are I'll survive until at least the Thanos finger snap. Then it'll be 50/50 until the Avengers end up undoing it. Now that I think of it, why would I want to try and change events anyways, given that I know the heroes will eventually win? Sure there's a 50/50 chance I may be dead for a bit, but at least I know I'll be coming back.

[Crazedwraith]

*shrugs* There's not a whole lot I can do apart from making some bets at Vegas. I could start spamming SHIELD, if I can even find them, with billets-doux detailing what's going to happen in the near future. Am I going to be able to get near Tony Stark, billionaire playboy? Are people going to have the patience to wait around and see whether I was right about Captain America being found in the Arctic ice? Are the Wakandans going to be pleased if I start spreading stories about how they have a mountain of vibranium?

Realistically: the only thing I could honestly do is be prepared. Don't go to New York City shortly after they find Captain America. Stay away from Sovokia. Stay the hell away from wherever Bruce Banner is. Count the days until the finger-snap and gamble on whether I'm going to still be around.

And if you try to tell SHIELD you've got to be sure to tell the good bit of it. Not the HYDRA Bit.

Unfortunately, if I'm understanding the scenario right if you get to fingersnap without stopping Thanos, you get reset to the start of the scenario, regardless of if you're in the untouched half or not.

It seems to me the only way to win the scenario is somehow convince the heroes of my trustworthiness and accuracy and then convinced them to extract the mindstone and have scarlet witch blast it long before the ticking clock of IW runs out.

This requires minimising changes up until AoU and then acting as fast as possible. But how to do that, I have no idea.

[The Romulan Republic]

*shrugs* There's not a whole lot I can do apart from making some bets at Vegas. I could start spamming SHIELD, if I can even find them, with billets-doux detailing what's going to happen in the near future. Am I going to be able to get near Tony Stark, billionaire playboy? Are people going to have the patience to wait around and see whether I was right about Captain America being found in the Arctic ice? Are the Wakandans going to be pleased if I start spreading stories about how they have a mountain of vibranium?

Probably you could get SHIELD's attention if you started posting things like Agent Coulson's security clearance or the existence of the energy weapons program online. Whether you'd WANT to get SHIELD's attention is another question, given that it also means likely getting Hydra's attention.

You could also use personal knowledge to contact someone like Tony and get them to take you seriously, but you might just be taken as a stalker and arrested, if not careful.

Personally, I think there's a lot of appeal in seeking out the Ancient One, since interdimensional transport, time travel, and multiple lives seems like something more up her ally than SHIELD's. Ideally, I'd try to find a spell that could get Q to bugger off and give me the option of returning home, though gaining a power-up as well wouldn't hurt.

Honestly, though, the first thing would be just to get a job and make sure I can keep supporting myself in this world. I probably have at least four years before four years before shit really hits the fan, as long as I'm a little lucky and keep my head down.

Realistically: the only thing I could honestly do is be prepared. Don't go to New York City shortly after they find Captain America. Stay away from Sovokia. Stay the hell away from wherever Bruce Banner is. Count the days until the finger-snap and gamble on whether I'm going to still be around.

Well, that actually guarantees you immortality of a sort, given the last part of my OP- you will be reborn endlessly when you die until you get a timeline where Thanos loses.

If you're down with that as a path to immortality, then from a self-interested standpoint this is the best bet.

This post should pretty much answer Tribble's points too, with the additional caveat that people are only assuming that everything will get undone/fixed in Infinity War II. We don't actually know that yet.

[Elheru Aran]

As for the Ancient One... she's unpredictable. Plus, if I go to her that early, I'm likely to run afoul of Kaelicius, and I have no desire to go the way of the librarian of Kamar-Taj. I'm also probably not nearly as smart or capable as Stephen Strange, so I don't know how far I could get with the whole magic thing. Somehow, I don't think a half-assed magic-user is going to impress anybody that much.

It *could* grant me a means of access to SHIELD and other individuals/organizations, though. So that's a thought. But it probably involves several months at least, if not years, of basically abandoning a life at 'home' (wherever that is).

Here, let's see. Say I want to talk to SHIELD. Do they have an office? A public telephone number? If I can get in touch with them, what's going to happen? I make an appointment, travel to wherever I'm meeting them, and say what? "Hi, I know Phil Coulson is really super-important to you guys and is like buddy-buddy with a bunch of superheroes, oh hey and you're gonna find Captain America in an iceberg, and get him together with Bruce Banner and Tony Stark, and you're gonna run into an alien Norse God in the way, two actually except one's good, he's the one with the really big hammer, and the other one is the bad guy. And I hate to tell y'all, but you got HYDRA all up in your business. Should probably do something about that."

Cue silence and funny looks. ".......Thank you. We'll keep this under consideration. Leave your number with us. Don't call us, we'll call you. Have a nice day."

Once stuff actually starts going the way I say it will? Sure, someone might get in touch with me. But in the middle of everything, particularly with HYDRA corrupting the organization... yeah.

[The Romulan Republic]

*shrugs* There's not a whole lot I can do apart from making some bets at Vegas. I could start spamming SHIELD, if I can even find them, with billets-doux detailing what's going to happen in the near future. Am I going to be able to get near Tony Stark, billionaire playboy? Are people going to have the patience to wait around and see whether I was right about Captain America being found in the Arctic ice? Are the Wakandans going to be pleased if I start spreading stories about how they have a mountain of vibranium?

Realistically: the only thing I could honestly do is be prepared. Don't go to New York City shortly after they find Captain America. Stay away from Sovokia. Stay the hell away from wherever Bruce Banner is. Count the days until the finger-snap and gamble on whether I'm going to still be around.

And if you try to tell SHIELD you've got to be sure to tell the good bit of it. Not the HYDRA Bit.

Yup.

Unfortunately, if I'm understanding the scenario right if you get to fingersnap without stopping Thanos, you get reset to the start of the scenario, regardless of if you're in the untouched half or not.

Pretty much. Thanos wins (meaning, he makes it to the fingersnap), then when you die you will be reborn at the moment you entered the MCU.

It seems to me the only way to win the scenario is somehow convince the heroes of my trustworthiness and accuracy and then convinced them to extract the mindstone and have scarlet witch blast it long before the ticking clock of IW runs out.

Cap would never sanction that, and Scarlet Witch refused to do it until Thanos was closing in on her and Vision was badly hurt. They're never going to do it preemptively on your word.

A better hope would be to somehow prevent Vision from ever being built. That might happen by chance due to butterfly effect, if Tony never acquired the Mind Stone, if Tony died before building Vision...

Of course, didn't the Mind Stone come from Loki's scepter? So doesn't Thanos already have it, and if things don't play out the same way up to a certain point, he'll keep it?

Ideally, if you go this route, you'd want things to play out the same until Stark/the Avengers/someone else not evil with the means to protect or destroy it got the stone, then somehow intercede to prevent Vision being built. Most simply, as you noted, that means trying to avoid changing anything too much until AoU, then then either talking down, robbing, or killing Tony some time during the events of Age of Ultron. Having the knowledge to know when to act, and the access to do so, means getting an in with Tony Stark. But how the hell you could get that close to Tony without substantially altering events I can't imagine.

This requires minimising changes up until AoU and then acting as fast as possible. But how to do that, I have no idea.

See above.

One more thing, though: I am going to space. If I got chucked into a world with honest-to-god starships and aliens, I am going to figure out a way to get off this planet and experience that somehow.

If I did so, that would also open up some more options, like finding/destroying the Soul Stone, or killing Red Skull so he couldn't tell Thanos how to acquire it.

[Crazedwraith]

It seems to me the only way to win the scenario is somehow convince the heroes of my trustworthiness and accuracy and then convinced them to extract the mindstone and have scarlet witch blast it long before the ticking clock of IW runs out.

Cap would never sanction that, and Scarlet Witch refused to do it until Thanos was closing in on her and Vision was badly hurt. They're never going to do it preemptively on your word.

You misunderstand my plan. My plan is to convince them to use the plan they went with in the film: Get our team of super geniuses to detach the stone from Vision without hurting him, then have Wanda destroy it when it's not a part of Vision.

Now it will be a lot more difficult to convince them to do it without imminent threat of Thanos as a motivator but it would also a better chance of success for the same reason.

[Tribble]

Ya, I never quite understood why Thanos gave out the mind stone... though it's possible he didn't know what it was at the time, or perhaps he was hoping doing so would somehow draw out the other stones (which in a sense it did). He also didn't seem to care all that much when the blue dude in Guardians of the Galaxy took the power stone for himself.

[Elheru Aran]

The downside is that without Thanos around (yet), particularly without the Black Order showing up as evidence that he exists... you got nothing to prove that they HAVE to remove the Mind Stone. Unless you can manage to get ahold somehow of the Guardians of the Galaxy, because Gamora and Nebula could testify to that, but that's about it, and in GotG I and II they're all a long way away from Earth.

[Crazedwraith]

The downside is that without Thanos around (yet), particularly without the Black Order showing up as evidence that he exists... you got nothing to prove that they HAVE to remove the Mind Stone. Unless you can manage to get ahold somehow of the Guardians of the Galaxy, because Gamora and Nebula could testify to that, but that's about it, and in GotG I and II they're all a long way away from Earth.

This is true. As I said, I have no idea how to go about doing it. I picked it because, it's the stone that stays on Earth on is most accessible and we canonically know CAN be destroyed.

Otherwise your options are: Try to convince Thor and see if he can destroy the Tesseract or Aether at the appropriate juncture. Or the wizards (ahem masters of the mystic arts) and the time stone, or the Xandarans and the power stone.

None of those seem particularly do-able. Indeed Thor 2 seems to imply the Aether at least flat out cannot be destroyed. The only manage it with the mind stone because of the whole 'can't defend against yourself' rule. Maybe blast the Tesseract with hydra/phase two weapons?

[The Romulan Republic]

As for the Ancient One... she's unpredictable. Plus, if I go to her that early, I'm likely to run afoul of Kaelicius, and I have no desire to go the way of the librarian of Kamar-Taj. I'm also probably not nearly as smart or capable as Stephen Strange, so I don't know how far I could get with the whole magic thing. Somehow, I don't think a half-assed magic-user is going to impress anybody that much.

Yeah, I'm not sure what it takes to learn magic. Is it something any moderately intelligent and dedicated person could do with enough time, or is it something that only the most intelligent/physically capable people can even begin to learn?

It *could* grant me a means of access to SHIELD and other individuals/organizations, though. So that's a thought. But it probably involves several months at least, if not years, of basically abandoning a life at 'home' (wherever that is).

Eh, I'm already in an unfamiliar universe. Home is very relative, at that point.

Here, let's see. Say I want to talk to SHIELD. Do they have an office? A public telephone number?

Probably, if they're a government agency.

If I can get in touch with them, what's going to happen? I make an appointment, travel to wherever I'm meeting them, and say what? "Hi, I know Phil Coulson is really super-important to you guys and is like buddy-buddy with a bunch of superheroes, oh hey and you're gonna find Captain America in an iceberg, and get him together with Bruce Banner and Tony Stark, and you're gonna run into an alien Norse God in the way, two actually except one's good, he's the one with the really big hammer, and the other one is the bad guy. And I hate to tell y'all, but you got HYDRA all up in your business. Should probably do something about that."

Cue silence and funny looks. ".......Thank you. We'll keep this under consideration. Leave your number with us. Don't call us, we'll call you. Have a nice day."

I mean, you know Coulson and May and Fury and Black Widow and Hawkeye and a few others who would presumably be active at this time are trustworthy. But even if you can get in touch with them to listen to you, you probably won't be able to do so without drawing attention, or convince them to tell only the "right" people.

Once stuff actually starts going the way I say it will? Sure, someone might get in touch with me. But in the middle of everything, particularly with HYDRA corrupting the organization... yeah.

I think if I was going to go the "contact SHIELD" route, I'd try to pick a character who I knew a fair bit about, enough to find them in ordinary life as opposed to official channels. Someone I know isn't Hydra, obviously. Then arrange a "chance" meeting, and try to convince them I have supernatural knowledge before they go telling their superiors. Very risky though, and could put me on Hydra's hit list, which is why getting at least some minimal protective magic first sounds really appealing.

So, my basic plan thus far would likely be:

1. Try and get a decent job (oh, fuck, did the MCU have a recession in 2008?), then save up enough money to go looking for the Ancient One.

2. Tell her everything, impress upon her that it is a really bad idea to let Kaelicius find out about any of this. With any luck, she'll deal with Kaelicius more effectively with what I can tell her.

On that note, I doubt it would be safe to ask, but I'd really want to know if she still has the same premonition of her death as in the original timeline. Could give me a sense of how much my actions are changing the timeline.

3. Once I have at least some protective magic and the option of hiding with the wizards if things go to shit, I contact someone at SHIELD. Probably Phil Coulson or Hawkeye. I try to do this all prior to Thanos sending the Chitauri.

Alternate Step 3: I go to Sokovia (long before the events of Age of Ultron) and try and find young Scarlett Witch and Quicksilver. Its underhanded, but they both seemed real quick to jump on Ultron's bandwagon, so they're pretty clearly gullible and impressionable. Honestly, they seem like they'd be good cult recruitment fodder. I am admittedly not a terribly charismatic or subtle person, but if I show off my foreknowledge, I might be able to convince them to follow my lead instead. Having some superpowered muscle with me couldn't hurt.

Steps one-three need to be accomplished before the Chirtauri show up or Hydra makes its move, at which point the Mind Stone comes into play/SHIELD is defunct and Hydra is running amok.

Not sure how the "get off Earth" plan would work. That's probably going to be a long-term one.

[Solauren]

Assuming my foreknowledge is updated to near perfect memory level (only way to make it useful), I do this

Write down the events of the MCU (movies) that does not involve the Guardians of the Galaxy

Go to the New York Sanctum, and knock until I get a response. While knocking, I'll mention beings like 'Dormomu', and 'Cyrotak'
When they answer the door, I want to speak to the Ancient One.

Explain to her I'm from an alternate universe, where a series of movies (and possibly TV shows) were created, that seem to be mirroring events to come in this universe. Ask for sanctuary, and training. My goal is to return home (with new magical powers), and/or help defend this world.

Assuming she accepts this, and since she can look into the future, see I'm not insane, I stay out of the way until after the events of Civil War.
At that point, I contact T'Chala, and the Vision, explain to him the Mind Stone is, and it's origins.

I get the Vision to go to Wakanda and have the stone mostly disconnected from him. Leave enough connections he can still use it as a weapon.
And have Wakanda manufacture something that looks like it as a decoy.

Then Thanos shows up, I grab Vision, and get him to Wakanda with the Scarlet witch, to disconnect the Stone from him, then have the Scarlet Witch destroy it, and replacy it with the decoy.

Worse case - Thanos has to come to Earth to get the remains of the stone to repair it. Best case - he can't, and I've saved the universe.

If he comes to Earth, without the mind-stone as a vulnerability, and with the added magical support I hopefully represent, Vision, Scarlet Witch and I can type up Thanos long enough for Thor to arrive and kill him with Stormbreaker.

I'm not going to try to change anything else, unless I can figure out a way to do that, and get better results. For that, I'd want to do the 'I looked into 14 million futures' trick Dr. Strange does in Infinity War.

This assumes I can use magic. If not, the Ancient One and I'd have to talk Wong into doing this, even knowing the Ancient One is going to die along the way.

[Elheru Aran]

People talking about getting involved with magic, by the way... you're assuming you'll be ABLE to get in touch with them. I'm fairly sure that if they're not inclined to be found, they won't be easy to find. Start spreading stories and asking questions, then they might take an interest in you, but otherwise? If Thor hadn't been around when Loki got snatched by Strange, he wouldn't have had the first idea of where to look for 177a Bleeker St.

[Crazedwraith]

Assuming my foreknowledge is updated to near perfect memory level (only way to make it useful), I do this

Write down the events of the MCU (movies) that does not involve the Guardians of the Galaxy

Go to the New York Sanctum, and knock until I get a response. While knocking, I'll mention beings like 'Dormomu', and 'Cyrotak'
When they answer the door, I want to speak to the Ancient One.

Explain to her I'm from an alternate universe, where a series of movies (and possibly TV shows) were created, that seem to be mirroring events to come in this universe. Ask for sanctuary, and training. My goal is to return home (with new magical powers), and/or help defend this world.

Assuming she accepts this, and since she can look into the future, see I'm not insane, I stay out of the way until after the events of Civil War.
At that point, I contact T'Chala, and the Vision, explain to him the Mind Stone is, and it's origins.

I get the Vision to go to Wakanda and have the stone mostly disconnected from him. Leave enough connections he can still use it as a weapon.
And have Wakanda manufacture something that looks like it as a decoy.

Then Thanos shows up, I grab Vision, and get him to Wakanda with the Scarlet witch, to disconnect the Stone from him, then have the Scarlet Witch destroy it, and replacy it with the decoy.

Worse case - Thanos has to come to Earth to get the remains of the stone to repair it. Best case - he can't, and I've saved the universe.

If he comes to Earth, without the mind-stone as a vulnerability, and with the added magical support I hopefully represent, Vision, Scarlet Witch and I can type up Thanos long enough for Thor to arrive and kill him with Stormbreaker.

I'm not going to try to change anything else, unless I can figure out a way to do that, and get better results. For that, I'd want to do the 'I looked into 14 million futures' trick Dr. Strange does in Infinity War.

This assumes I can use magic. If not, the Ancient One and I'd have to talk Wong into doing this, even knowing the Ancient One is going to die along the way.

I was assuming if you blew up a stone long enough before IW you'd win the scenario as with it gone Thanos can't get all the stones. You don't actually have to take out Thanos. I'm also assuming that if he hadn't been literally standing right there when it blew, he wouldn't have been able to rewind time to get the stone.

I mean, Thanos with five stones is probably going to wreck the universe something awful but If I've won the scenario I won't be in that universe any more.

Of course, some how taking out Thanos himself before IW would also win the scenario but longer odds on that happening than destroying a stone. (Though if you'd convince the GotG and Avengers to help Nebula's post GotG2 attempt on him, apparently it almost worked, then again if I could convince the Avengers to do anything I could tell Thor to stop fucking about with the troopships and just hit Thanos as he shows up. That was the cheapest bit of the end for me. Thor can effortless take Thanos down, he just didn't show up until it was too late for no apparent reason. Literally every other Avengers on the planet turned up to tackle him, Thor's off dealing with mooks)

[The Romulan Republic]

People talking about getting involved with magic, by the way... you're assuming you'll be ABLE to get in touch with them. I'm fairly sure that if they're not inclined to be found, they won't be easy to find. Start spreading stories and asking questions, then they might take an interest in you, but otherwise? If Thor hadn't been around when Loki got snatched by Strange, he wouldn't have had the first idea of where to look for 177a Bleeker St.

I'm trying to remember how Strange found them in Doctor Strange. After all, he was just some non-powered shmuck before then. Okay, a rich, brilliant surgeon, but he wasn't anything superhuman or anyone particularly powerful.

Assuming my foreknowledge is updated to near perfect memory level (only way to make it useful), I do this

Write down the events of the MCU (movies) that does not involve the Guardians of the Galaxy

Go to the New York Sanctum, and knock until I get a response. While knocking, I'll mention beings like 'Dormomu', and 'Cyrotak'
When they answer the door, I want to speak to the Ancient One.

Explain to her I'm from an alternate universe, where a series of movies (and possibly TV shows) were created, that seem to be mirroring events to come in this universe. Ask for sanctuary, and training. My goal is to return home (with new magical powers), and/or help defend this world.

Assuming she accepts this, and since she can look into the future, see I'm not insane, I stay out of the way until after the events of Civil War.
At that point, I contact T'Chala, and the Vision, explain to him the Mind Stone is, and it's origins.

I get the Vision to go to Wakanda and have the stone mostly disconnected from him. Leave enough connections he can still use it as a weapon.
And have Wakanda manufacture something that looks like it as a decoy.

Then Thanos shows up, I grab Vision, and get him to Wakanda with the Scarlet witch, to disconnect the Stone from him, then have the Scarlet Witch destroy it, and replacy it with the decoy.

Worse case - Thanos has to come to Earth to get the remains of the stone to repair it. Best case - he can't, and I've saved the universe.

If he comes to Earth, without the mind-stone as a vulnerability, and with the added magical support I hopefully represent, Vision, Scarlet Witch and I can type up Thanos long enough for Thor to arrive and kill him with Stormbreaker.

I'm not going to try to change anything else, unless I can figure out a way to do that, and get better results. For that, I'd want to do the 'I looked into 14 million futures' trick Dr. Strange does in Infinity War.

This assumes I can use magic. If not, the Ancient One and I'd have to talk Wong into doing this, even knowing the Ancient One is going to die along the way.

The problem is, once you change one big things, you won't be able to keep other big things from changing, if you assume that the butterfly effect applies. Hell, even little changes will pile up over time. Like, say, you pause while crossing the street. A car slows down to avoid hitting you. Said car therefore does not hit a random guy three blocks further down the street. That guy lives, becomes one of the activated Inhumans on Agents of SHIELD, becomes a supervillain, and ends up killing Phil Coulson with a chance lucky shot. Or any of a trillion trillion other possibilities.

So you have to choose when you intervene carefully and for maximum impact, avoid making waves before then, and not leave it too long, if you want to have much effect. You can't realistically micro-plan a fight down to specific moves by watching the movies, which is something I think a lot of these sorts of scenarios tend to miss. You need to think in terms of larger strategy/outlook, while leaving the details flexible. Ideally have multiple paths to whatever you want to achieve. And its largely a game of "pick your allies".

In a way, your knowledge of the past (secrets from the past in particular) is more useful than your foreknowledge, because it gives you information most people don't have, but it won't change (unless someone rewrites the timeline, anyway).

[Crazedwraith]

Alternate Step 3: I go to Sokovia (long before the events of Age of Ultron) and try and find young Scarlett Witch and Quicksilver. Its underhanded, but they both seemed real quick to jump on Ultron's bandwagon, so they're pretty clearly gullible and impressionable. Honestly, they seem like they'd be good cult recruitment fodder. I am admittedly not a terribly charismatic or subtle person, but if I show off my foreknowledge, I might be able to convince them to follow my lead instead. Having some superpowered muscle with me couldn't hurt.

You realise that they have no powers until they get experimented on by Hydra between Avengers and Winter Soldier right? Powers granted by the Mind Stone? It's a plot point in AoU and IW

[The Romulan Republic]

Ugg, I forgot that because its been forever since I saw AoU, and maybe also because that wasn't the origin of their powers in other media.

So that's out as far as getting powered allies is concerned.

I still want a backup if magic doesn't pan out, though. Anyone else who is easy to persuade/recruit who has superpowers? I'm drawing a blank here.

[Crazedwraith]

Ugg, I forgot that because its been forever since I saw AoU, and maybe also because that wasn't the origin of their powers in other media.

So that's out as far as getting powered allies is concerned.

I still want a backup if magic doesn't pan out, though. Anyone else who is easy to persuade/recruit who has superpowers? I'm drawing a blank here.

Eh. Not really, if we count Agents Of SHIELD theoretically might be able to find some inhumans to help but not really one we ever saw on screen.

[The Romulan Republic]

Ugg, I forgot that because its been forever since I saw AoU, and maybe also because that wasn't the origin of their powers in other media.

So that's out as far as getting powered allies is concerned.

I still want a backup if magic doesn't pan out, though. Anyone else who is easy to persuade/recruit who has superpowers? I'm drawing a blank here.

Eh. Not really, if we count Agents Of SHIELD theoretically might be able to find some inhumans to help but not really one we ever saw on screen.

Skye comes to mind as a possibility, though she was unpowered at that point unless you count being a brilliant hacker as a power. Early series Skye would absolutely be interested in "I'm a guy from another universe with knowledge of the future", and not likely to go running to SHIELD/Hydra. Probably impossible to find, though, given that she had basically erased her own identity and was living out of a van. Unless 2008 was before that happened.

There's also that Asguardian professor character from AoS, but he doesn't seem to have much in the way of useful contacts, nor any interest in drawing attention to himself or getting involved in larger events from what I recall. You could try blackmail, but blackmailing an Asguardian seems like a phenomenally dangerous thing to do.

[The Romulan Republic]

Actually, I think plan B may be to run for office post-Winter Soldier, presuming that I hand wave the issue of having valid ID for the MCU. "The government was systematically infiltrated by Nazis" ought to be great fodder for a radical Left-wing anti-establishment campaign. Run for Congress in the MCU 2014 Midterms, then for President in 2016 (I'm 28, so presuming I'm the same age when I arrive in 2008 rather than de-aged, and that the movies' events line up roughly with the year in which they were released, and that the qualifications for the Presidency are the same in the MCU, then I'd be 36, and legally able to run for President, in 2016 in the MCU-verse). I'm seriously thinking about running for office in real life (though not at that level), and its a course that doesn't involve me personally engaging in combat (I am unpowered and unskilled when it comes to combat), so it has some appeal, despite a lot of obstacles and risks (particularly of radically changing things before I'm ready).

If I win, maybe I can straighten out the whole Accords/Civil War cluster fuck. A united Avengers team might fair better against Thanos and his minions.

[FaxModem1]

Guys, we have infinite loops to play out, This is a really long Groundhog Day to do with as we wish. You just need to think fourth-dimensionally.

First off, grab a newspaper or look online after the first Wednesday or Saturday in the timeline, look at the winning lottery numbers. Memorize them. Then go jump off a skyscraper. Boom, you're back where you started. Purchase a lottery ticket with said lottery numbers. Using this capital, invest in companies that will take off in the MCU, such as Killian's booming tech business, and buy a controlling share. When AIM takes off, you become much richer. If Killian becomes a problem, either move him out of the way, or get killed, and do the lottery business over again and find another tech giant that will boost our initial incomes. Work to reform Killian if possible. If not, buy time for later.

We then acquire IGH, and find Karl Malus, and with our league of scientists and financial gains, find what he has, and work on his methods to become stable. See what things he has that are noteworthy, and what are not, and see if some peer review can help him out. His methods are inhuman, but his works do have merit. This, combined with EXTREMIS, might lead to some amazing civilian applications for everyday society.

Second, since Hank Pym is easily accessible at Pym Technologies and work to become Pym's protege. Unlike Darrien Cross, we're not selling to HYDRA, and after he takes us into the fold, we can work on combining Extremis and Pym Particles for civilian applications. This will surely get noticed by SHIELD, and get us a seat at the table. Then we start revealing a limited version of the future, and explain what's going on. Try and get an audience with Steve Rogers, and explain the situation, under the guise of improving both our and his situation with our own science and his biochemistry.

Explain to him that HYDRA is a cancer within SHIELD, but the world will still need SHIELD anyway because there's going to be alien invaders, and it's best to have a force to deal with that threat.

Steve now knows about Bucky, Thanos, and what's going on, and can bring the rest of the Avengers in. And we have an organization that can give people superpowers, while also improving the quality of life for millions, if not billions of people.

And if I fail, just another reset when Thanos snaps his fingers, and I try another method.

[The Romulan Republic]

Guys, we have infinite loops to play out, This is a really long Groundhog Day to do with as we wish. You just need to think fourth-dimensionally.

But then, you are essentially creating/obliterating multiple universes, feeding multiple cosmoses into the meat-grinder, in order to win.

At that point, I'd actually think that you'd qualify as a bigger monster than Thanos.

You get another shot (or, alternatively, are doomed to live through it again and again) if you fail. But that doesn't mean I'd start with deliberately failing as Plan A. Granted, you probably will fail the first run, and maybe the first ten runs (hell, maybe the first million runs). But, even leaving the considerable ethical implications aside, I feel like you'll learn more from those failures if you try and bring your A game every time.

First off, grab a newspaper or look online after the first Wednesday or Saturday in the timeline, look at the winning lottery numbers. Memorize them. Then go jump off a skyscraper. Boom, you're back where you started. Purchase a lottery ticket with said lottery numbers. Using this capital, invest in companies that will take off in the MCU, such as Killian's booming tech business, and buy a controlling share. When AIM takes off, you become much richer. If Killian becomes a problem, either move him out of the way, or get killed, and do the lottery business over again and find another tech giant that will boost our initial incomes. Work to reform Killian if possible. If not, buy time for later.

Oh, I do like the idea of trying to buy out Killian, though it requires having considerable wealth already, as you noted.

We then acquire IGH, and find Karl Malus, and with our league of scientists and financial gains, find what he has, and work on his methods to become stable. See what things he has that are noteworthy, and what are not, and see if some peer review can help him out. His methods are inhuman, but his works do have merit. This, combined with EXTREMIS, might lead to some amazing civilian applications for everyday society.

Second, since Hank Pym is easily accessible at Pym Technologies and work to become Pym's protege. Unlike Darrien Cross, we're not selling to HYDRA, and after he takes us into the fold, we can work on combining Extremis and Pym Particles for civilian applications. This will surely get noticed by SHIELD, and get us a seat at the table. Then we start revealing a limited version of the future, and explain what's going on. Try and get an audience with Steve Rogers, and explain the situation, under the guise of improving both our and his situation with our own science and his biochemistry.

Explain to him that HYDRA is a cancer within SHIELD, but the world will still need SHIELD anyway because there's going to be alien invaders, and it's best to have a force to deal with that threat.

Steve now knows about Bucky, Thanos, and what's going on, and can bring the rest of the Avengers in. And we have an organization that can give people superpowers, while also improving the quality of life for millions, if not billions of people.

And if I fail, just another reset when Thanos snaps his fingers, and I try another method.

Trying to get into the tech. industry could give you an in with Stark, as well. Although I feel like Pym probably won't be very approachable, and I can't for the life of me recall who Malus is. Is he the guy who experimented on Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver?

[FaxModem1]

Karl Malus is the guy who created Jessica Jones. His goals, like Thanos, are good, his methods are wrong. However, I'm of the belief that science gotten through ill-gotten means can still be used for good. And unlike the idiots in the MCU, I'm not against giving the common person super healing, super strength, and creating a new age for mankind. I'd love to see what happens if Thanos gets dogpiled by 50 SHIELD agents with the strength of Jessica Jones.

[The Romulan Republic]

Oh, that explains it. I don't have Netflix, and thus haven't watched the Netflix shows.

And yeah, I kind of agree. While I can understand concerns about making every person a walking WMD, or a sudden massive social upheaval, just giving everyone some extra durability probably wouldn't do that any more than, say, the invention of vaccines did, and it would save so many lives. And when in doubt, its unquestionably better to have a level playing field than a small number of powerful elites and a world of largely helpless canon fodder.

Hey, that can be part of my MCU campaign platform:

"Socialized Super-Medicine For All! Single Payer Powers! Vote TRR 2020!"