Hi fellow trooper,

I also recently started this game, early September (Senjutsu made me nostalgic to reinstall the game; I last played in 2016... the game has changed a lot, I basicly re-learnt to play it ).
I'll tell you what I learned in this period, I hope others will add / comment also if I'm speaking nonsense, so I can also learn from it

1. There is no generic good setup
You always have to adapt to the content you're running, be it the story campaign, LoL, BNW, daily/weekly dungeon (gold key) or whatever dungeon from the rift. Even different difficulty levels may require different setup.
Since not just the players but the enemies are also using talismans - certain battles require preparation.

2. Read the guides section of the forum
It has some very good topics worth reading like (just to pick a few really important generic topics) :
https://forum.ironmaidenlegacy.com/s...er-s-Guide-v-1

https://forum.ironmaidenlegacy.com/s...set-Management

3. Stuff to look for
In general you'll want to look for a balanced party to cover major roles, just like in any rpg, but that alone will not guarantee success. There is really no one-and-only way to overcome even any one obstacle in the game, most of the challenges may be handled multiple way.
Still in general, you'll want to
- have some heavy damager
- have someone to debuff your enemy ( remove beneficial/golden effects )
- have someone to remove debuffs on self/enemies ( remove harmful/silver effects )
- have someone to buff self/allies ( grant beneficial/golden effects )
- have someone with the ability to heal allies
- have someone with the ability to resurrect allies

The above roles are of course more than the free slots in any party so obviously you'll want a setup that contain toons where the roles overlap.

This is the backbone - now you top all of this with various talismans, talisman combos, keeping in mind that talisman stats _should_ align your toons stats.
for eg. if your toon is a gunner dealing physical dmg, you will want to look for 'will' type talismans for him/her and the very least 'bulwark' types. you may also want to consider warrior talismans on colorless lots for said character on colorless slots, preferably the 'fierce' type. Cosmic talismans are especially useful as you can put it to any slot with set items that would otherwise appear on a 2-4 pieces of set talismans...

If one combination doesn't work, and you get stuck, try to analyze the problem.
What went wrong, why did I die? How could I prevent it, what options do I have?
The Compedium can be a great help, to defeat foes or even build tactics. You need to disable passive for Avalon? Check the compedium entry on 'Effects', look up passive disable and perfect disable (almost every effect has a basic and an elevated version be it positive or negative effect), and you can check what toons have that ability in any way - and you can check which ones do you own of them.
As you progress further in the game, you'll have access to better and better toons and the ones you thought to be hella strong become weak by time.

All in all, there's no telling what works best 'in general', it's all a complex thing, a mixture of what you are facing with, what's the problem you have, what toons and talismans you have access to.
Oh and Dark Road Eddie is one of the best Eddie in game, so be very glad you have one (I don't).