Hola, as we say in Nordish. Well...we don't...but I'm too lazy to look up nord greetings. Anyway, on to your questions.

Finding crafters: zos doesn't allow trading posts in the forums, so you can't directly so you can't directly solicit crafters here. However you might meet some asking about sets. It's helpful if you cite your server (i.e., PS4 na) so people know whether to offer or not.

The guild system is a good way to meet people for all kinds of game stuff. Join a big guild. Players have small profiles on the roster...master crafters usually list that they're willing to craft. You can always PM a guildie to ask to have something built. But with text chat, it's become common practice just to put out a guild/zone chat asking politely if someone can craft for you. Be specific, "anyone willing to craft me Hundings Rage? I want Order of the Hoir armor but daedric weapons. I have mats." (Always have the mats collected and ready if you're asking by chat...)

Required mats: c160 gear is made from rubedite, rubedo and ruby ash. C160 was designed to be a resource sink, so when you move to c160 gear it's a big jump in required materials - 100-150 per piece. Seven pieces of armor require 940 mats, then you'll need several hundred more depending on what weapons you want.

Beside the material, you need a style stone for each piece to match the motif you want. You also need one trait stone per piece that gives that piece a buff. As a newbie, I recommend you focus on divines and infused for the armor and sharpened for the weapons. If you want the crafter to upgrade the armor, it's 2 green, 3 blue, 4 purple and 8 gold per piece to get to those color qualities respectively.

Crafted gear needs to be enchanted...d'oh! So remember to craft or buy glyphs...one per piece.

NOTE: on craft sets, once you wear it the item is bound, and cannot be passed back to anyone else. For now you can have crafters make you blue or purple gear, but down the road you will want to be able to upgrade your bound gear. Therefore, start working up your smith, cloth and wood by deconstructing any crap you pick up. You do not need to invest points in being able to make high level gear, but you do need the passives that reduce the cost of upgrading color (temper expertise in smithing, with equivalents in the others). I also recommend metal extraction and its equivalents...this allows you to pull more resources from refining, including gold mats. With three points spent in metal extract, a stack of 200 raw metal should return 1-3 gold tempering alloys...vital for working toward the 56 you need for a gold armor set.

Don't forget to tip. If someone takes time to craft you gear, ask them what sort of tip they want. Some will cite a price. Most say "meh...whatever." If they don't cite a price, I recommend like 50 raw high level ore or maybe any one gold mat.

Undaunted normal/vet: vet dungeons scare you? They should, bwa ha ha... Anyway, yeah, they're tough...some more than others. It's a good idea to run some non-vet pledges to get an idea of the sort of mechanics the game will throw at you. And when helping new players, I've found that 200ish champion points is when vet dungeons stop feeling like a slaughterhouse.

This might seem discouraging, but don't worry...Champion Points are earned pretty fast at first, then they take longer and longer to accumulate. There's also a "catch up mechanism" called enlightenment, which once per day let's you earn 400k xp at 8x the normal rate. You can store up to 12 days enlightenment, which is listed on your character sheet. If you only played through your enlightenment, you'd get to c160 in three weeks. If you play more and grind hard, people get there in 7-10 days.

A good measure to me as to whether your character can handle 4 player vet content is whether they can solo some of the dungeons or normal maelstrom arena. If you can solo normal banished cells or fungal grotto, you're getting ready. If you can solo normal maelstrom, you're definitely ready.

When you're ready to try, look up some guides on the specific dungeons of the day (like from deltias gaming). Start with the easier dungeons. When one comes up, do a text chat that explains you're a newbie tank looking to learn the dungeon and see if anyone wants to run. It will be infinitely helpful if you find a group with experienced players who know the mechanics.