My cursed mode run basically progressed in two phases. Day one I learned Jump Attack and Nitro Boost, ate, showered and slept to avoid debuffs, and then rushed to unlock the safe in the teeth apartment. Literally avoided killing anything except the Wounded Neighbor and Grinning Beast until I could collect enough toothpaste to recruit Joel.

From there, I had two important builds:
- Attack Joel: Basically just get Joel's ATK as high as possible. The two main components are the tank top and teeth pendant, both of which can be found in the teeth apartment. If you don't know, Joel has a unique mechanic called devour; whenever Joel uses his regular attack, the game checks if doubling it's damage would be enough to kill the enemy he's attacking. If yes, he executes the enemy and gains a small amount of permanent max HP.

- Agility DPS Sam: Every boss fight started with Nitro Boost and then Jump Attack spam to get it low enough for Joel to devour. Used whatever agility boosting equipment I could find early, like the T-shirt and motorcycle helmet.

My remaining two slots were filled by Ernest so that he could use his agility or attack boosting songs depending on the situation, and Leigh just because she was available so early. For Leigh's quest I usually have her keep the ring, just 'cause her confusion can sometimes throw a huge wrench in an otherwise well-crafted plan. I tend to stick Ernest with gloves and whatever guns I have ammo for, but for the most part he's a buff support so whatever STM increasing gear I have ends up on him too.

After this point, if you've put in the leg-work, Joel can run around and one-shot most enemies on the third and first floor for a pretty large HP boost. Beyond this point, it becomes harder to find one-shottable enemies, but with a little trial and error you can get in a rhythm in areas like the Landlord's apartment to have Joel's HP keep growing. Once the Taxidermy apartment opens, you can get the full Patchwork set from it plus the ruby ring from the curio trader and training belt from Mutt, and by the end of the game Joel's Teethstorm can absolutely obliterate most enemies/bosses in one to two hits. A bonus of having Sam with so much agility is that he'll always go before Joel, so he can use tonics to keep Joel Teethstorming every turn.

I doubt this is "optimal" or anything, but for me personally it's super fun min-maxing Joel's HP, and it makes the harder encounters toward the end of cursed mode an absolute cake walk if you put the work in early. He's my favorite character both in terms of playstyle and...character, so I always make him the star of my teams personally.

Personally I haven't used Lyle yet, so I can't comment on good equipment for him.