That sounds like an awesome amount of effort and wasted time. Level 70? That doesn't exist in the original difficulty of the game. For those unaware, the difference between "Normal Mode" and "Easy Mode" in the Final Fantasy Origins PSX release is that Normal caps off at Level 50, where as Easy goes up to 99. Anyways, my point for necro'ing an almost 1-year old thread is to say this:
A Black Belt/Master can not only do 2000 damage, he can even go as far as to do 4000+ damage, at Level 50. Another thing that I haven't seen while browsing the category is somebody's understanding that for every level the BB/Master gains, his Damage stat goes up by 2. So a Level 50 BB/Master has 100 Damage. I [u]ALWAYS[u] include 1 or 2 BB's with every party I make. The best one so far, has been the Fighter, Black Belt, White Mage, Black Mage combo. The Fighter gives you some damage insurance at the beginning of the game while you wait for your BB to reach Level 10. Here's what my general regimen consists of from beginning to end: (For those too lazy to read it all, just click the link to my video at the bottom to see the results)
1] Choose party. (Fighter, BB, WM, BM)
2] Buy Weapons: Rapier => Fighter, Wooden Nunchucks => BB, Staff => WM, Small Knife => BM.
3] Buy Armor: Chain Armor => Fighter, Wooden Armor => BB, Cloth/Shirt => WM & BM
4] Fight to Level 3 then fight Garland. (Easy)
5] Travel to Pravoka, Levelling to 5 and upgrading magic, weapons and armor as needed before you face the Pirate hoard and head down to Elfland.
6] Fight Ogres east of Elfland to earn the $$$$ to buy (Silver) weapons, armor and magic, and Level to 10. (Fairly time efficient considering the Ogres' payout)
7] Once at Level 10, I remove all weapons from the BB for good because he can do more damage without, and then I head for the Marsh Cave. Slimes are still a pain-in-the-ass to kill but meh. The wizards put up a fight, but go down easy.
8] If I have a House handy, I travel straight to Astos' castle, save right outside, and proceed to hand him his dark-elven butt (RUB does cause problems, but that's why I save it right outside). If no House in inventory, I go back to the Elfland INN to save, and come back. I'm usually at Level 12 or 13 at this point.
9] I go do the other stuff necessary to get me to Melmond, and then to the Earth Cave where I traverse the Hall of Giants and/or fight the Earth(s) guarding the chest in the Northeast room of the first level, until I reach Level 20, and my memory is a bit fuzzy, but I seem to recall being able to afford that 45000G piece of armor for the Fighter as well. (Don't put too much faith in that piece of memory though)
10] Once at Level 20, feel free to do whatever the hell you want because the BB starts to get incredibly powerful very quickly. I personally like to go the Lich, Airship, Class Change, Tiamat, Kraken, Kary path because once you get past Tiamat and the levelling that occurs, everything becomes ridiculously easy.
11] Once you reach the Temple of Fiends (with EXIT and/or WARP in your magicks) stay on the first floor fighting Frost/White Dragons until Level 50. You get 1701EXP per party member for every 4 dragons you kill. You get to Level 50 surprisingly fast.
Lucky for you all, I kept a video of when I had my PlayStation hooked up to a TV-Tuner vid card I had a while ago. This is the Origins release, but it stands the same for the NES original as well. [edit] i just did my own test of the TMPR and SABR spells, and I will confirm that both are useless. FAST however, still does wonders...
Level 44 Master + Giant Gauntlets/Gloves (Sabre/SABR) + Haste (FAST)