PICE alliance is no more unless someone else continues it.
The majority of us have merged with other (more) experienced players into a small upstart alliance which is negotiating becoming a wing of the strongest alliance of our quad.
The only way you can catch up and join us is if we push you resources and you learn how to play well very quickly.
In game message 'injate' and I'll reply with our secret weapon/map which is good for finding people who are loosing the beginners protection (who, if inactive, are always full of loot to be robbed) soon - and finding 0 growth players who are farms and unlikely to put up any defence (important early on, you gotta keep your troops alive)
There's also a "travel Time" search. Use it to find a zero growth 2-10 pop player that is 4-5 hours away, so the return trip totals to 8-10 hours. that's 8-10 hours for you to sleep and not have to worry about your army getting wiped by attacks/raids. Your resources can still get ripped off very easily at night though...Loosing resources only is better than loosing your army and resources though.
There's a lot more to the game. Read FAQs on the forums.