You must fail at rpgs.. lol j/k
Every version I have touched of FFIV(and that's every damn one other than DS) was actually quite easy.
Magnet Cave was easy as !@#$%. Just don't use metal stuff. LOL. I beat the game my first run though at level 64 with Cecil. Yes, that was the actual HARD TYPE version.
Just powerhouse your way through.
One basic level up strategy:
If you find that your levels suck, easy way to level up quickly~
Kill everyone in your party besides Cecil.
You can hit level 50 with Cecil way before his transformation in just a couple of hours.
And in his transformation, you can be level 25+ before you even leave the Trial Mountain-whatever-its-called in just an hour.
Do this with the characters you use most. Needless to say you can reach level 99 under the 20 hour mark if you know where to go.
If you are using Cecil and Kain for pretty much power houses, cast beserk, haste, protect, and other stat increasing spells and just let them bust loose.
Meh, other than that.