Find someone you can trust and who trusts you, and gang up on everyone else. This can be very useful, but beware of being stabbed in the back. All it needs is 10 attacks on your base to kill you. Build walls around your base and keep a unit or two in reserve.
Power is vital to survival.
Some of these people have done this before. Try to spot trends, not only visually, but what people are actually doing. Protect your base. Protecting your base means cutting off all possible angles of attack - fortifying walls are excellent towards this end. Power isn't everything.