Exploit Allowing NPC's to Join a Player's Army

There is an exploit that allows a player to add NPC units to their own forces in a blockade or siege. Their army does not battle the NPC's, but rather, the NPC's end up helping to fortify the blockade or siege. Here is an example from a scout report with the player info redacted. I have a dozen or so such reports.

So the troops in a blockade or siege won't fight animals, and will actually get reinforced? I think we saw something similar with undead during the last tournament. Occasionally the undead would reinforce the first army on the square.

There are many players with 10 cities and less than 200,000 population. 200k strains food production and is less than ideal for military players because you can't raise taxes. Once players get their 10th city, many of them start knocking down the buildings to reach a more flexible population. It wouldn't surprise me if most 10 city players had 150-175k population.

Edited by Brandmeister - 09 Aug 2013 at 15:28

Idk if I would call this an 'exploit'  it may not be intended but its completely random if a set of animals decides to reinforce.  No one can send an empty siege army and use 100k animals to do the siege.  

It is not random.  If you send a blockade to the square where an npc is currently residing, the blockade will be reinforced by the npc.  Not too much fun when at war and a myriad of crawlers is blockading your city and you have to waste 4000 cavarly to clear and your enemy only loses one troop.

Or...Keep critters away from your cities!