For my PCs, I have a collection of generic caster/archer/two-handed/shield and sword minis used to represent my characters. Anything close is good enough.

When I DM (AL), I prefer to use abstract tokens that represent the different monster types rather than minis. I find a board with 20 actual miniatures to be hard to follow unless I've already learned what all the PCs miniatures look like. I also like to have my tokens numbered so i can quickly and easily identify which monster is being attacked and track HP by logging it under that monster type/number.