Does patrolling with 0 unrest kill population too?

[LintMan]

Originally posted by Yossar:
If you're in a castle, there are many times you don't want to patrol since that army is no longer safe. If there's no fortress and no unrest I don't think there's any reason to pick defend over patrol, though.

Unless I need the patrolling, I tend to leave them on defend. My theory is that while you might have your regular armies out patrolling, you'll probably have your priests preaching and your mages researching/forging. Then, if your castle province is surprise attacked, the priests/mages stay in the castle (I think), while the rest of your army is left to fight without priest/mage support (and without any summoned units that your mages might be commanding). Without that support, you army may not be tough enough to repel the attacker, and then you end up with a scattered/destroyed army and all your priests/mages under seige in the castle. It seems less risky to keep all your amry in the castle, and just leave it to your (hopefully high) pd to repel most minor invaders. For major invaders, you lose your pd, but your full army with all support priests and mages has no losses and is available to break the seige the next turn (or to better defend/repair the castle until further help can arrive).

Just my 2 cents.