In the early days of World War II, a covert military experiment turned Steve Rogers into America's first super-soldier: Captain America.Marvel Source
During the war, Cap served as a symbol of freedom and America's most effective special operative. In the closing days of the war, Captain America disappeared in an explosion over the North Atlantic and was presumed dead.
Decades later, his body was discovered trapped in ice, preserved in a state of suspended animation! Upon his revival, Captain America joined the Avengers and once again took up the heroic battle against evil.
Gear
Slot 1 – Uru-Enhanced Shield or Zero-Point Energy shield. (Captain Unique's)
Uru-Enhanced Shield has an Excalibur's worth of life on hit and then some, some Durability (meh), a bunch of +'s to varying shield abilities including Shield Bounce (yay) and more damage than Zero-Point, oh and a ton of def.
Zero-Point Energy Shield gives us less damage but tons of def, energy def (which can be hard to come by), a proc for bonus damage (meh), attack speed, chance to deflect projectiles (nice), and a large chunk to ALL Shield Slinger powers (Shield Bounce, Indestructible Shield, Shield Expertise are the ones we use).
I dont think its a contest, we take Zero-Point because we can just throw Lemurias on him and get the health benefit, and the +to Shield Slinger is pretty amazing as well as the deflection and increased Energy Defense for tanky-DPSness. Both are great though.
Slot 2 – Stark Industries Support Armor (Captain Unique): Loads of Def, health, dodge, +1 Durability (woo hoo, again), +3 to Living Legend powers (so all of our melee skills), +to Indestructible Shield (yay), and +to all Super Soldier powers (so our shout and Signature, basically).
Slot 3 – Invaders Photograph (Captain Unique) - Good defense rating, spirit, spirit regen, with a shout active everyone gets a ton of Def (1kish) (makes Aggressive Aura give some added tankiness, I rather like this). Proc to summon the original Human Torch when hit (sure, why not) who is almost always up (30 seconds summon, 1 minute downtime), a bunch of health, +1 to all powers, +2 to Super Soldier (shout/sig). I would take this for sure, pretty nifty.
Slot 4 – Boondockers (Captain Unique) - Def, spirit and health on Movement (long CD-meh), a mini-Khonshu-when you use a Movement power your next melee does extra damage, Damage with melee (a bunch), attack speed, tenacity, special item find, +1 to all powers. Honestly I'd go with:
Tank Option: Shield Meditech Support Boots (all hero) - Decent tank stats, +2 to all powers, when you use a medkit allies regen spirit, 1 minute CD for a "when you hit, chance to heal allies" proc. Health and some much needed health regen.
DPS Option: Footstigons (all hero) - Movement speed, crit rating and regular (flat) damage with Melee, dodge, chance to ignore all damage, +1 to all powers. Very good in their own right.
Slot 5 – The Captain's Mask (Captain Unique) - Def, Crit rating, Brutal rating, -13% spirit cost for powers (Shield Bounce I'm lookin at you), Khonshu proc-Shield Bounce makes next melee do tons of damage, +3 to all of our Melee skills. I like this.
Artifacts: Tanky/DPS stuff:
Advanced Crimson Crystal: health, damage, chance for invul
Xerogen or HoD: Standard damage stuff
Advanced Meta: I like the +to all powers, personally. Could also do a Khonshu. With his Aggressive aura, we're not so reliant on attack speed. I just want to get moar power points and hit hard.
Super Soldier Serum: If you need to be more tanky. I know people are on the nerf-train with this but it gives a bunch of relevant survivable stats and the proc isn't bad. Regular Meta for the same reasons as Advanced if you need it.
Other
Blessings: Hela or Odins. Nothing new.
Costume: Strength/Fighting, surprise. His Strength is terribly low (3) while his Fighting pre-stat rework is where it needs to be for stats. If you have to pick one, get some Strength. Throw straight damage rating on your costume, since because of our melee/ranged damage split we have to itemize elsewhere for crit to avoid not getting the right stats.
Insignia: O'Gradysaurus
Legendary: Excalibur doesn't directly benefit Shield Bounce, which makes me sad. For that reason I would consider Gungir and try to optimize other stuff for straight up damage as opposed to crit, to make full use out of Gungir.
Medallion: Probably Bullseye to compliment your Gungir or Kingpin. The main problem is Kingpin doesn't help Shield Bounce, but Bullseye does. I like Bullseye. Grim Reaper is also viable to give us some much needed brutal before we can get Hela Blessings, when paired with our Slot 5. Minimal, but we can try. Additionally, Taskmaster as a "Jack of All Trades" medallion may not be so bad. Gives us a little bit of everything we need.
Relics: Probs Lemurias. Especially if we don't go with the Uru Shield, I really like these. Shield Bounce is going to return a bunch of health to us and we're lacking a bit in the regen department anyway.
Leveling Strategy
We get most of our tools fairly early. Heroic Strike will murder trash and bosses alike at super low levels, we get our dash, and we very quickly acquire Aggressive Shout and Shield Bounce. At that point is pretty gravy, and our only major problem is we have to wait a tiny bit to get Vibranium Bash. Shield Bounce does so much work though, we don't really need it. Dump points into passives when you can-and try to keep Shield Bounce maxed as you level. If you can get +Vibranium Bash or +Shield Bounce on your gear, use it. Always remember to toggle Aggressive Aura on!
Playstyle
1. Dash into enemies and knock em over.
2. Shield Bounce ftw which does tons of damage and nets you a lot of melee damage.
3. Vibranium Bash enemies and put in some Heroic Strikes to get your spirit back when you get low.
4. Shield Bounce moar.
5. In trouble? Indestructible Shield ftw.
6. Vibranium Bash, oh wait-its all dead.