I need help on comic timeline/reading order in regards to Tony and the Guardians

[Bladedheart]

Hey all, I'm having one hell of a time understanding the sequence of events with the Guardians of the Galaxy. I only recently got back into reading comics after a couple decades and I went a bit overboard on cheap kindle comics. I expected to have a bit of trouble with events but google isn't even helping me clarify. Effectively, because of the damned movies, Peter Quill is now my favorite character and I'm trying to read his entire history (at least from Annihilation on) but I can't figure out when he comes back to "life" after his trip to the cancerverse. The first instance I've found of him is in the 2013 Guardians.... yet it appears he met up with Tony Stark at some point prior to that but can't figure out what issue/series that happened in. I also have to assume it actually showed him doing stuff prior to meeting Papa Spartax in that seedy bar, but again, can't figure out where! But I've moved on from that (not that I don't want to go back because as soon as I hit Agent Venom joining the team I'm gonna stop the Guardians and read AV's stuff).

But then I have another issue as well. When the hell does Iron Man LEAVE the team? I had assumed it would be during the events of Infinity but that doesn't seem to be the case at all. I can't quite figure out the timeline there either. In whichever issue (I'm at work and my kindle is at home so I can't check) it just out of the blue mentions that Tony isn't with the crew anymore and they say they aren't even sure he's alive. What the crap happened there! I'm a decent ways into Infinity now and no explanations are to be had so far. I'm at the point (again, not sure which issue, sorry) but they are trying to find Thanos' son right now.

If anyone can give me issues/series to answer my questions, that would be great. Google isn't helping at all except to point me to a solitary half-page of an unmentioned comic that shows Peter telling Tony to check out the stars. I don't mind picking up additional comics on kindle (they're honestly pretty cheap for the combined volumes) but I'd rather not get too out there with comics on characters I don't care much about. Currently I have, but mostly haven't read, Spidey from when he took his body back from Doc Ock, all of Agent Venom's "solo" stuff, all the Guardians from Annihilation on to include Star-Lord's "solo" adventure and a few events; Infinity, Annihilation/Conquest, AvX, and Original Sin. I also understand I need to pick up Black Vortex. If there's anything else I need, I'd be happy to hear it. Star-Lord is my main focus right now, but I love Venom (and Agent Venom seems like an awesome version of him), Wolverine (will pick him back up when he gets his own series again as I understand he just resurrected the other day), Spidey but I think I have all the Spidey stuff I need, though if he was in any events that I need to understand his main series I'd appreciate hearing that too, and I love Iron Man but haven't picked anything up from him. I may wait till he gets out of his coma and use that as a starting point. Thanks in advance for any clarity y'all can provide. It's a dark day when google fails me.

[SuperiorIronman]

Tony went to space for awhile and started hanging out with the GOTG. Tony's own comic takes place somewhere in-between those adventures or towards the end and in either case the positioning isn't all that important (this is during the Godkiller arc). During Gillen's run Tony eventually tried searching for a villain known as 451 (he has an incredibly long serial number) and Tony leaves the team in his own book. I'm not sure if Tony's time with the team has anything to do with Infinity (though I could be wrong).

[Bladedheart]

I had a feeling that was going to happen. It just bothered me a lot that Tony is chilling with Peter and crew and then BLAM! out of nowhere "he might be dead, Pete! We just don't know!" Do you by chance have a decent jump on point for the Iron Man comics for that portion?

I love Iron Man, but of all the characters I want to get into, I'm the most apprehensive about him because he's one of THE main Marvel characters and seems to have his hand in EVERYTHING. I don't want to read everything Marvel just to understand what is going on with his character. The web that is Marvel (presumably all) Comics is frustrating me. Maybe a tad more than I expected. I think that's the biggest draw I had to Star-Lord, I assumed he would be far enough from Earth (most of the time) that I wouldn't have to read literally everything when there are just so many characters I don't care for. In reading Infinity I'm honestly blown away by all the characters that I don't recognize.

[SuperiorIronman]

I had a feeling that was going to happen. It just bothered me a lot that Tony is chilling with Peter and crew and then BLAM! out of nowhere "he might be dead, Pete! We just don't know!" Do you by chance have a decent jump on point for the Iron Man comics for that portion?

I love Iron Man, but of all the characters I want to get into, I'm the most apprehensive about him because he's one of THE main Marvel characters and seems to have his hand in EVERYTHING. I don't want to read everything Marvel just to understand what is going on with his character. The web that is Marvel (presumably all) Comics is frustrating me. Maybe a tad more than I expected. I think that's the biggest draw I had to Star-Lord, I assumed he would be far enough from Earth (most of the time) that I wouldn't have to read literally everything when there are just so many characters I don't care for. In reading Infinity I'm honestly blown away by all the characters that I don't recognize.

If you want a GOTG appearance I remember that Quill makes a small cameo when Tony is leaving to find Deathshead around issue 9 of the Gillen run (this is also where he leaves and is on the first page) which you can find under Marvel Now!. As a jumping on point, the Iron man book at the time really had nothing to do with GOTG and was focused more on what Tony was doing when not with the team. If not reading GOTG I'm pretty sure the only indicator was in issue 9 and that was when Tony left.

[Bladedheart]

Alright. I think I finally figured it out though. It seems to be in Age of Ultron and/or one of the Avengers Assembled from 2012, which I picked up, and he seems to leave and return in a few volumes which I borrowed on comixology. I appreciate the assist though.

Comics are friggin complicated. I ended up having to research Thanos to get half an answer on when Peter actually popped back up and I guess it still doesn't even explain how they got free of the Cancerverse until Guardians 18. Which is fine... I just wanted his "full" run. Hopefully figuring out the timeline of his solo comics and the Guardians comics won't stress me out. Heh.