Psytek

You can enchant your armor to boost magic stats once you get far enough in the game, using armor should be fine.

You really don't need to lug so much stuff around. If you are keeping things just to sell to make money, then don't pick up anything that has less than a 10:1 value to weight ratio, because once you factor in what you actually get from a store, you really don't make enough money off all the non-valuable junk.

Best thing to do is get a companion and take them with you, you can trade with them and give them all your heavy stuff.

I'm playing as a wood elf, focusing on the thief skills, and also one handed weapons.

" @Psytek said:

" I've said it before and I'll say it again:  Worrying about the graphics in a console game is like being concerned about the taste of paint.  "

Maybe you should stop saying that because it doesn't make any sense. "

Two of the same catalog don't stack. 
Different catalogs can work simultaneously, but that isn't stacking, because their effects are different. 
 
I have all 3 catalogs on my party, and I've had battles than ended with all 3 drops, shrouds, rares and normals all at the same time, so I know they work together.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: 
 
Worrying about the graphics in a console game is like being concerned about the taste of paint. 

There are definitely parallels with the FFVII setting in XIII, people seem to be getting into argument about quality, but that's not what this topic is. OP didn't say "FFXIII is better than FFVII" he said he was getting a FFVII vibe, and I think he's right, he just isn't articulating it very clearly. 
 
There's the theme of an oppressive and power-hungry ruling body, in this case the cocoon fal'cie and the sanctum, in FFVII shinra. 
There's a bad guy behind the scenes pulling the strings and trying to orchestrate the destruction of everyone on the planet. (Barthandelus, Sephiroth) 
Lightning is a former solider, and there are lines which are blatantly dropping the SOLDIER reference at the start of 13. Her outfit bears a lot of throwbacks to clouds, with the sleeveless zip-up cardigan under her jacket. 
 
You idiots need to stop getting hung up on which character/game is better. The fact remains, this is a final fnatasy game, the themes throughout the whole series don't deviate too much, and this one in particular was designed with the intention of capturing certain facets of 7.  
 
Also, in terms of character depth, XIII's characters are much deeper. But really it's a technical limitation. The emotional range of the characters in 7 basically boiled down to what hand motions the characters could make, and in XIII they are more able to emote. 
 FFVII had very little character development aside from the flashback for cloud and for sephiroth. You barely find out anything about any of the other characters except for vincent. In FFXIII, most of the characters have fully realised back stories, and there are some very convincing emotional situations, like Sazh with his kid, the dynamic between Fang and Vanille, the development of the relationship between Snow and Lightning and Hope's maturation (although Hope's is the least convincing for me). 
 
And before everyone jumps down my throat, I'll just say, 7 is still my favorite final fantasy, but the character development is better in XIII, it has to be, it's been 13 years, storytelling in games has got better in general. And the OP's point is correct, there are a lot of similarities between 7 and 13, if you care to look, instead of just arguing about which game is better. (which was not the topic)

From the Giant bomb FFXIII page:  
 
 For her design, character designer Tetsuya Nomura was asked to create a "female version of Cloud Strife from Final Fantasy VII."

This only applies towards the end of the game, but around chapter 10-11, when the battles start to get more difficult it becomes very important to be buffing and debuffing. 
Most hard mobs and bosses pretty much require you to exploit the debuffs they are vulnerable to. You can use libra if you having a hard time, or just have a sab keep casting stuff to find out what they are susceptible to. Staggering is a must early on when you're characters can't stand up to strong attacks, If you can stagger something and launch it, you don't have to worry about healing, haste deprotect and deshell are especially important until you get to level 9 in the crystarium.  When I first got to the  archilyte steppe my characters were way too weak to take on the stronger enemies like the behemoths, but if you get a pre-emptive on them, you can debuff them, use haste and then launch them for 4000cp each. Thats the best way to level up before you go to Oerba.
 
The char who gets haste earliest is sazh, so it is worth using him in chapters 9-11 until hope can get it. Hope is a stronger magic user, and a better choice at the end, but until he has haste, consider using sazh as your synergist for the harder enemies.