I just made a new character and I want to do the main quest last. How do I avoid starting it? I need to talk to the steward in Whiterun to turn in bounties/give him a sword, etc, but does walking into Dragon's Reach automatically start the MQ?

yeah, I think you'll need to start it at least...
in my opinion is best doing the main quest until the first dragon, else you won't be able to get shouts from walls I think, not sure tho because I didn't try.
To completely avoid it I think you must not talk to the guy in riverwood who will send you to whiterun's jarl.

Don't go to bleak falls barrow when the wizard sends you there, that should allow you to do other quests for the jarl.

I've gone through the Bleak Falls/Golden Claw thing without starting the MQ. The only thing that I messed up was taking the Dragonstone from the Deathlord at the end. Now I can't get it out of my inventory. Otherwise, I've never gone to Dragonsreach and have never seen a dragon after Helgen with this character.

Simply don't talk to the Jarl of Whiterun. I resumed from there at level 37 with no problems.

I'm kind of a fan of working through the Main Quest up through "Dragon Rising" since that causes dragons to start spawning. Without that, the Word Walls are fairly useless since you need the Dragon Souls to power the Shouts.

I've made characters that totally avoided Dragonsreach and started the MQ around lvl 40. Just don't talk to the Jarl or enter the Palace. You don't have to turn in the bounty and avoid taking on the quest where you have to bring a sword to the Steward. After a few playthroughs, you should know who to talk to, what to say, what to avoid etc. LOL There are enough quests to keep you busy.

My current character hasn't seen a Dragon, besides Alduin, in her life! When people tell her to keep an eye on the sky, she looks up and wonders Why? Will it rain tonight? hahahahaha It's a different pace and I can fast travel without fear of sudden dragon attacks that might wipe out the population of say Riverwood, for example LOL

Just branch out on your own right after you escape Helgen and get to Riverwood. A word of caution: if you're trying to make some money by doing odd jobs and side quests around Riverwood, be careful doing the Golden Claw side quest for the trader. He'll send you to Bleak Falls Barrow to retrieve his item. Bleak Falls is the same dungeon you'll have to explore as part of the MQ for the Jarl's wizard. So try resist the temptation to over explore that particular dungeon on that side quest. Doing so might cause you to stumble into the narrow passage that leads you into Bleak Falls and where the MQ artifact is.

If you do end up doing this

The good news : you instantly get to finish Farengar's MQ quest right after the Jarl introduces you to him.
The bad news : Giving the Bleak Falls artifact to Farengar will officially trigger the appearance of Dragons in Skyrim. The first dragon mound opens in the Rift hold during the Bleak Falls Barrow MQ quest.

Also note that once you speak with the Jarl in Whiterun, you can no longer opt out of triggering the appearance of dragons in the MQ sequence of events. The Bleak Falls quest begins immediately after you speak with him by default. Another annoying feature is that the Jarl will automatically address you, if you get too close to where he's sitting on his throne.

So if you're trying to complete the side quest for the Jarl's Steward (who is always standing to the right of the Jarl in the throne room) just hit the tab key to opt out of the Jarl's conversation and avoid replying. This will prevent you from automatically completeing the MQ "Before the Storm" quest.

However, also note that you CAN

Over explore Bleak Falls during the Golden Claw side quest, get the dragonstone MQ artifact, and begin your freelancing activities (aka avoiding the MQ line) from that point on. But doing so will cost you. Your stamina stats will take a BIG hit having to carry the dragonstone. You'll be stuck with the misfortune of carrying a 25 stone deadweight in your inventory all around Skyrim. This can be a real pain at the lower levels if you want to make gold faster by tomb raiding.

The only upside to doing this, is that there won't be any dragons to contend with in the game until you speak with the Jarl.

This.

I go to dragon reach all the time to enchant daggers with banish and have not done any quests at all and I'm in the 30s.

Strictly speaking, the main quest starts at the beginning of the game. The only way to avoid it entirely at the beginning is to use console codes (PC only) to start in a different place and use them again to reset it to started later on.

You can avoid having dragons come into play by not starting/completing the Bleakstone Barrow quest for the the Jarl's mage.

You can also pause the main quest at this point:

What the others said, don't go to Bleak Falls.

I'm wondering now that the implications of going to Bleak Falls or not are known if you can't simply leave the Dragonstone on the Draugr Deathlord at the word wall, continue about your non-MQ business as long as you like, then go back and get the Dragonstone at some later point if you feel like doing the MQ?
Also, I read in another thread that quest items are weightless despite having a listed weight when viewed in inventory and both UESP and the Wiki support this. Haven't verfiied it for myself.

I found you can also pause (at least this is what happened in one of my games ...) on the - this had the same effect of no dragons spawning randomly and I only encounter them in their relative perches. It's a great way to get a few of the basics, and seek out dragons when you need souls - as opposed to being lynched at every fast travel

If I don't want random dragon attacks then the easiest is not to hand over the Dragonstone. But if you do this, you can't talk to Farangar about anything, because as soon as you do the stone is taken off you and the next bit starts. Alternatively, you could leave the stone in Bleak Falls Barrow after visiting it. Since enemy levels are fixed on first entry, it would be easy to go and get it later. I've heard people say that if you don't do the quest to kill the first dragon, but do hand over the stone, you get dragons on dragon walls, but no random attacks. But keeping that quest open must be quite difficult. If I want dragons, just don't want to complete the MQ, I usually stop after the Greybeards send me for the horn.

I've done the main quest up to the point of Dragon Rising and have yet to see one dragon related to the main quest. As long as you don't go near the watchtower near Whiterun, the dragons will not start appearing. I'm at level 34 and haven't had a single dragon bother me yet, because I have yet to go near the watchtower.

Give the Dragonstone to the wizard. Somewhere in his dialogue he asks for it and if you have it he will automatically take it

_{Get to the point where you know you are dragon born and have met the greybeards, I then you can do everything after that without having to worry}

Right, but when I tried to do this, at least Ireleth won't let me leave Dragonsreach with getting into the dialogue about seeing the Jarl about the dragon attack in Helgen and from there getting wrapped up in the MQ, which in this thread we're trying to avoid. My suggestion(s) are to either 1) leave the Dragonstone with the Draugr Deathlord in Bleak Falls or 2) just carry it around (I think as a quest item it's weightless).

Technically, you should be able to do this as long as you don't stray too close to the Draugr's coffin or the Word Wall. Approaching the Wall is designed to trigger the Dragur boss fight. Keeping to the path to the far left of the dragur/word wall, should allow you to access the stairs leading up to the exit. Didn't try this, but it sounds very feasible.

Nope. Just like Barenziah's gems from the TG radiant quest, the MQ dragonstone artifact cumulatively ends up weighing a ton. The gems in particular, are an epic fail because they (and that TG quest) is glitched. The gems don't stack like they should and weigh 0.5 stone each Which really adds up in your inventory. With the dragonstone, best to just avoid that part of the Barrow quest, or avoid speaking with the Jarl.

Quest items dont actually weigh anything in your inventory, so there's no problem with carrying the dragonstone

I did a little experimenting last night which I think covers/clarifies most of what was discussed here.

- the Dragonstone weighs nothing even if you haven't started its quest.
- that quest won't start until you speak with Jarl Balgruuf.
- you can back out of his conversation at the beginning if he automatically tries to talk to you.

You can safely talk to her without advancing the quest.

Take my advise and do the MQ untill the Greybeards instruct you to go find the horn of Jurgen Windcaller ...leave it right there and jump onto the rest of the game.

I have done this with more then one character. It is not hard at all to go up the stairs out the back of the dungeon. Just stay away from the word wall and you will not trigger the Draugr Boss. Since he has the dragonstone in his coffin, you have no fear of getting it either. So you can do Lucan's Golden Claw quest, but not complete Farengar's dragonstone quest.