You should have tried to sport one of these wonderful arm patches like this
They are cool and fashionable....all the rage
On a side note if you guys are close together then forming an allaince is good but if you are spread out it will just make easy pickins
And no you don't need to be in one to win. For an alliance win you need 470 points average within your group for 3 days or a personal win of over 500 points for 7 days