The Taskmaster acquired his abilities after ingested a "mnemonic primer", a chemical serum which altered his brain chemistry to make him hypercognitive in the area of skill observation and retention.
Photographic Reflexes: The Taskmaster's only superhuman abilities were that of his photographic reflexes. He was able to duplicate almost any physical act he sees after seeing it done by someone else only once. Taskmaster can use this ability to master complex gymnastics routines and play difficult pieces of music. However, he typically prefers to use this ability to copy the combat skills, both armed and unarmed, of costumed crime-fighters and expert martial artists from around the world, typically seen through watching videos of them in combat situations. He can also copy the subtle muscle movements of others so precisely that he can at times do things such as copying another persons voice so precisely as to fool voice recognition software.
Near-Superhuman Mimicry: Due to these reflexes, he can do things which border on superpowers. For instance Taskmaster has discovered that after watching martial arts movies on fast-forward he is able to briefly duplicate the moves at a greatly increased velocity, effectively giving him a limited form of super-speed. However, as he does not have any sort of enhanced endurance, this puts a great strain on his body and he is only able to fight in this manner for short periods of time.
Physical Movement Prediction: He can also do things such as figuring out the sleight of hand techniques of a master poker cheater simply by watching them.[citation needed] He has often shown the ability to actually predict an opponent's next move before they make it if he has studied their fighting style enough. Opponents who are skilled at improvisational fighting styles, or who have a more random unpredictable style are less likely to have their moves predicted by Taskmaster.
It was hinted during the Siege that he was below Class 50.
Abilities
Olympic-Level Conditioning: The Taskmaster was an Olympic-level athlete and was possibly among the most formidable armed and unarmed combatants in the world.
Expert Tactician: Taskmaster is a master strategist and tactician (seen particularly in combat with Iron Man and against both Captain Americas during the Siege of Asgard).
Other Skills: Taskmaster learned meditation techniques in Tibet, he also claims to have learned forensic methods from CIA Agents and Mossad Operatives.
Fighting Styles Studied Characters: Taskmaster learned personal styles of these individuals from watching videos or from combat: Ant Man, Batroc, Black Widow, Boomerang, Bushwacker, Blacklash, Black Knight, Black Panther, Captain America, Genis-Vell, Cable, Crossbones, Daredevil, Deadpool, Elektra, Falcon, Fatale, Firestar, Hawkeye, Iron Fist, Justice, Libra, Machete, Moon Knight, Oddball, Power Man, Puma, Punisher, Razorfist, Shockwave, Silverclaw, Silver Samurai, Spider-Man, Shatterstar, Swordsman, Tigra, Tumbler, US Agent, Warbird, Wolverine and Zaran.
Strength level
The Taskmaster possessed the normal human strength of a man of his age, height, and build who engages in intensive regular exercise. The Taskmaster was strong enough to lift at least twice his body-weight, meaning he was able to lift at least 440 lbs.
Weaknesses
The Taskmaster is not capable of duplicating a physical feat if the effort to do so requires superhuman effort. For instance, while he could view an opponent lifting a car, he could not do so because his body can't duplicate the superhuman strength required to do so. In the same way, he cannot duplicate any energy manipulating or projecting capabilities for the same reasons.
His abilities are also limited in that they did not grant him an innate understanding of underlying disciplines. For example, as a child, he nearly drowned after imitating a dive because while he was able to mimic the dive, he did not know how to swim. Because of this, he has a fear of drowning.
Taskmaster was unable to copy the moves of Alex Hayden for unknown reasons.
When Taskmaster copies something new, it pushes old memories out of his brain in a form of amnesia.