History BatmanGambit / FanWorks

** When trying to find the mystery beast that the Zoo Crimes Division is hunting for so Zim can use it for himself, the Announcer feeds the media the idea of a bogus big money reward for tips leading to its capture, with the tip line being routed to Zim's base. This allows the Computer to sort through the countless tips to find useful information, while the ZCD is tied up by all the people out looking for the creature to earn the reward.
** Tak deliberately gets herself thrown into solitary confinement on Moo-Ping 10, so that she can take advantage of the lack of surveillance to dig her way out of the cell to a spot that enables her to retrieve [=MiMi=] and access a teleporter she can use to escape.
** The Minion Trio manage to steal back the Ceramic Clown Puppy with a multi-staged one of these: [[spoiler:they lure Dib to an abandoned building by using a light show to make him investigate what he thinks is Zim's latest scheme, then tar and feather him. While he limps home from this, Bob insults him along the way, until the Announcer holographically disguises himself as Gaz to meet him outside the house, "scare" Bob off, and give him a desperately-needed pep talk to gain his confidence, and then follows him inside past the deactivated security system so he can steal the Puppy before Dib realizes what's happened]].
** During the CourtroomEpisode, Zim's (brainwashed) lawyer James Conroy riles [[CorruptCorporateExecutive Aldrich Coathanger]] up on the witness stand by mentioning past allegations against him, eventually causing him to blurt out a confession about being a [[spoiler: child murderer]]. This causes Aldrich to resort to [[ScrewTheRulesIHaveMoney throwing money at the judge and jury to cover it up]], leading to a free-for-all over the cash that causes the whole trial to collapse, letting Zim off free from the charge of having stolen tech from Aldrich to begin with.

* ''Fanfic/TheChaoticMasters'': After his initial WoundedGazelleGambit to make the Titans emphasize with and free him from [[SealedEvilInACan his prison]] fails, the Collector resorts to hitting Raven's BerserkButton until he provokes her into attacking his LivingShadow form, after luring her into a position where the attack would hit Starfire and spill her blood on his mirror to free him. Fortunately, Gogo intervenes and knocks the mirror out of the way in time.

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* ''Fanfic/{{Forward}}'' has a couple of these, the first being one hatched by River and Jayne [[spoiler: while being held captive by Niska]], which allows them to [[spoiler: break free by convincing Niska to kill one of his goons and Jayne palming a weapon from his body.]] Later on, River uses one to convince the rest of the crew that she's dangerously unstable, so they leave her behind while going on a job, during which she is able to sneak away and do a job on the side.

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[[AC:''Series/{{Firefly}}'']]

[[AC:''Literature/HerculePoirot'']]

* ''Fanfic/OnceMoreWithFeeling'':

* In "[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13266807/1/Ice-cold-deception Ice cold deception]]", Thawne’s alliance with Nora is revealed to be intended to provoke the Barry of 2019 into visiting him in the future before his execution; where Thawne’s powers were suppressed by Cicada’s dagger in canon, here he was being kept immobilised by anti-meta tech, but he had an implant on his body that allowed him to absorb some of Barry’s energy during the confrontation and use it to disable the control collar.
* In "[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/35046859 someone new?]]", Frost basically does this to set Barry and Caitlin up on a date with each other after Iris has left Barry under unspecified circumstances. While Chester and Allegra arranged separate dates for Barry and Caitlin via dating apps, Frost created a fake profile for Barry's date and arranged for one of Chillblaine's friends to be a fake date for Caitlin, thus ensuring that both would meet at Jitters afterwards (as far as Barry knows, his date stood him up and left him waiting at Jitters while Caitlin left the club where she was to meet her date once he proved unpleasant and went to Jitters to calm down). When Chester asks why Frost didn't just work with him and Allegra to set Barry and Caitlin up directly, Frost explains that she knew the others couldn't keep a secret and Barry and Caitlin would just be awkward if they thought they'd been set up with each other, but by arranging their dates in venues where Barry and Caitlin would rendezvous at Jitter's out of habit, Frost had faith that they would come together on their own.

* In ''Fanfic/PointOfSuccession'', Light and [[OCStandIn Mr. Junko]] fake a scene where one of them pretends to be injured in order to confirm that [[ImpersonatingAnOfficer Matt isn't a real cop]] because when they shout for help [[WhatTheHellHero he doesn't even stop to look.]]

** The Minion Trio manage to steal back the Ceramic Clown Puppy with a multi-staged one of these: [[spoiler: they lure Dib to an abandoned building by using a light show to make him investigate what he thinks is Zim's latest scheme, then tar and feather him. While he limps home from this, Bob insults him along the way, until the Announcer holographically disguises himself as Gaz to meet him outside the house, "scare" Bob off, and give him a desperately-needed pep talk to gain his confidence, and then follows him inside past the deactivated security system so he can steal the Puppy before Dib realizes what's happened]].

* ''Fanfic/MadWorldInvaderZim'': It's revealed in the final chapter that the entire story was a plot put into motion by [[spoiler:Miss Bitters]], for the purpose of permanently defeating [[EldritchAbomination The Thing in the Wall]].

** Uncle knows that Daolon Wong knows how to summon [[SealedEvilInACan Tarakudo]], who the heroes need to interrogate for information on [[VillainProtagonist Jade]], and also that he won't divulge it willingly. So, [[spoiler: with help from Captain Black, Uncle stages a jailbreak, convincing Wong that he's gone behind the backs of the other heroes, so Wong will help him conjure Tarakudo. When the ritual is successful, Wong predictably double crosses Uncle and tries to cut a [[DealWithTheDevil deal]] with Tarakudo -- at which point Tohru and the Section 13 agents waiting outside the shack they're in bust in, arresting Wong and leaving Uncle and Tohru to question Tarakudo.]]

** [[OperationBlank Operation Steel Lightning]] is basically one big one of these: [[spoiler: Jade plans on letting the newest mask "accidentally" end up on one of the good guys (it was meant to be Jackie, but ends up on Captain Black instead), forcing them to tap into its powers (which she accomplishes by tossing Black off a tower), hitching a ride into Section 13 in their shadow (with the mask's awakened powers hiding her presence from Uncle's protective wards), then using a spell to fully awaken the General inside and having them distract the agency while she breaks into the Vault and steals the other masks and the Talismans.]] And it almost goes off without a hitch, with only Agent Wisker's [[SpannerInTheWorks unforeseen interference]] preventing a victory. [[spoiler: BUT, Jade still gets away with the info the heroes had on the Teachings (a Shadowkhan/Oni TomeOfEldritchLore) as a ConsolationPrize]].

* ''Webcomic/DadVillainAU'': After determining that the former Hawkmoth is a member of Paris' rich and elite, Tom sets up a trap at a charity ball by anonymously commissioning his own bakery to craft a display of Miraculous-based treats. Part of Gabriel's Wish was that ''he'' would be the [[ExactWords only person]] to remember the original timeline, unwittingly permitting kwamis like Nooroo to retain their memories as well. Thus, Gabriel is the only attendee (aside from [[spoiler:sentimonsters like Adrien]]) to recognize the significance of how these particular treats are decorated. Gabriel's ''outrage'' at seeing the innocuous baked goods results in him SayingTooMuch -- or rather, just enough to confirm to Viceroy his target's identity.

* In ''Fanfic/MiraculousTalesOfScarletBeetleAndIkatiBlack'', Adrien is given permission by his parents to have a birthday party, with plans to invite his classmates plus Mendeleiev's class sans [[AlphaBitch Chloe]]. Nathaniel, secretly the Butterfly user [[BigBad Monarch]], knows that Chloe will try to sabotage the party out of spite, leading to potential Akumas. So he deliberately leaves his phone with the class Chat about the party for her to find, and as he expected she fakes an email from Gabriel saying that the party is canceled and that all the students are plebians. Despite Adrien's protest that his father isn't like this, the email stirs up Nino's old frustration at authority figures, enough for Monarch to Akumatize him into the Bubbler.

* "[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/3004123/1/Dark-Legacy Dark Legacy]]" has Zorpox return when a pre-recorded message is received featuring Zorpox declaring that he created a doomsday weapon that will soon go off, forcing Kim to let Global Justice turn Ron back into Zorpox to find the weapon. Wade realises too late that the weapon was actually a complete fiction, intended to force Global Justice to react to the fake threat on short notice and thus give Zorpox the opportunity to escape by exploiting the gaps in the system.

* In ''Fanfic/MallRatsTLH'', Lincoln wants to leave because he sees his three bullies. Leni tells him it's rude, so he distracts her by bringing up the romper she wants.

* The VillainProtagonist Tyrin Lieph in ''The Council Era'' successfully [[spoiler: predicts exactly how the Council will respond to his son's death, how the dezba will respond to a dezban high chieftain's execution, and how the public will respond to the dezba's reaction]] in order to massacre the dezba, who he perceives to be a threat to galactic security.

* ''Fanfic/ForgedDestiny'': Jaune pulls this off against the fanatical [[spoiler:Tyrian]]. Realizing that his friends wouldn't be able to defeat such a skilled opponent, he made a show of attacking the enemy's object of worship. The attack would have been entirely ineffective, but [[spoiler:Tyrian]] didn't know that and left himself completely open while attacking Jaune.
* Jaune's final plan for dealing with the Fall Maiden in ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/12574905/1/In-the-Kingdom-s-Service In the Kingdom's Service]]'' is to taunt Cinder with Emerald's death before she's killed, insuring that Emerald is the last woman she thinks of as she dies. [[spoiler:Emerald's death was faked and Jaune leaves her in a chemically induced coma in the catacombs of his new intelligence agency, insuring no one else ever becomes the Fall Maiden]].

** The minion trio manage to steal back the Ceramic Clown Puppy with a multi-staged one of these: [[spoiler: they lure Dib to an abandoned building by using a light show to make him investigate what he thinks is Zim's latest scheme, then tar and feather him. While he limps home from this, Bob insults him along the way, until the Announcer holographically disguises himself as Gaz to meet him outside the house, "scare" Bob off, and give him a desperately-needed pep talk to gain his confidence, and then follows him inside past the deactivated security system so he can steal the Puppy before Dib realizes what's happened]].

* ''[[Fanfic/MadWorldInvaderZim Mad World]]'': It's revealed in the final chapter that the entire story was a plot put into motion by [[spoiler:Miss Bitters]], for the purpose of permanently defeating [[EldritchAbomination The Thing in the Wall]].

* "[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/3004123/1/Dark-Legacy Dark Legacy]]" has Zorpox return when a pre-recorded message is received featuring Zorpox declaring that he created a doomsday weapon that will soon go off, forcing Kim to let Global Justice turn Ron back into Zorpox to find the weapon. Wade realises too late that the weapon was actually a complete fiction, intended to force Global Justice to react to the fake threat on short notice so that they would bring him back using limited resources so that he could escape.