The thing you have to remember is that the tournaments are 'balanced' for everyone. It doesn't matter what rank or how far in the game you are BUT those further along in the game have higher prices to pay for upgrades etc + spending a lot of time with guest race things, so many will take a back seat in tournaments if it's not their boosted resource. If I do tournaments it's only for the KP and KP in the guest races can be a pain to get rid of unless you want to plough them into the 'getting worse' ancient wonders. That's why we have started to see quite a few fellowships with 1 or 2 top 50 players and the rest 'starter' accounts (alts more than likely). It's easier for those top 2 players to get 10th chest for the blueprints.
Just enjoy the game. If your wanting those blueprints find one of those fellowships, you will enjoy because only a couple of them will be active in chat
With trades, you cannot just blame the FS your currently in regardless of when and if they log in each day. It's also down to your neighbourhood. Find those active ones and scout towards them and also make sure the option is ticked to allow your city to be moved to a more active area if it isn't already.
In the FS I'm in, no one is pressured to do anything they don't want to. We have a laugh and enjoy the game. Trades are picked up when they are picked up. No pressure, we can all wait a little longer.