So, for fun I decided to try and compete the main quest line without levelling... at all... on master. At the beginning it was pretty smooth sailing, Restless Draugr and Bandit Leaders were about the toughest mob I had run into but now that I have completed visiting High Hrothgar, dragons are appearing in the wild and it's getting quite difficult to progress.

Almost everything that drops is iron, with a tiny amount of steel - so far I haven't found anything better. Almost no enchanted gear is available at this level, so I haven't been able to collect any of the really useful enchants like elemental or magic resist. Casters and elemental effects like dragon breath are pretty much instant death. Bite attacks from dragons are also instant death (often with a special kill animation as well).

Is there anywhere to find out where static loot items might be? Even a single piece of dwarven/elven armor would be huge, and knowing where to go to get specific enchants would be massive. I know that there are legendary items from quests, and a few levelled pieces, but so far finishing these quests has been out of the question.

Also, any thoughts as to Azura's Star? Would it be better to go black or white, I am not sure if humans or monters will spawn more grand-level souls as a level 1.

Not sure, but there might be full dwarwen armor/weapon set in Markrath. The museum. I mean it is a dwarwen museum, would be kind of stupid if the loot was iron in beginning of the game.

Have received ebony weapons (usually axe or sword) from the last fight in the tomb where you find the lost verse (Bard's College quest) at pretty early'ish levels. Took my warrior there last night and got a sword, was in the 12-14ish range at the time, so it might drop even earlier. Same has happened in a few other Draugr tombs.

Why not just level smithing and make some decent weapons/armor?

I would deffinately say go with the black, as every "human" has a grand soul. At level 1there will be next to nothing creature wise with a large soul.

Thanks for the tips, I'll definitely check out the dwemer museum and Markath - I haven't been up there yet. I am just about to start the bards college quests, that might be another good source of gear.

Great advice on the Star... never even occured to me that the human souls were always grand, I should have looked that up!

My smithing is getting quite high, but with no perks I am limited to Iron. Finding weapons with higher base damage is the only way to get better!

Thieve's Guild questchain might get you somewhere with Chillrend and the Nightingale gear too.