How about 'maybe'?
Seriously, if there's a small group with him, you could _probably_ tell
he wasn't alone -- but wouldn't have any idea how many. If there's a
small army in there...it's far more likely to show. (I'm basing this on
real-worldish estimation.)
So reporting something like:
Blood Tower [xxx], tower, defense 20, owner:
Feasel the Wicked [501] accompanied by <a few|some|many> others
Could be a reasonable solution. Even if the boundaries aren't exact (some
random overhead to blur the categories), it still maintains a real-world
'feel'--you can't tell WHO the few are ("Are any of them wearing a white hat?")
but can get an idea of hw big the force is. It also permits some bluffs, by
filling a sublocation with peasants to push the numbers higher, or a small
number of elite troops to keep the count down. The implied or actual size
of the structure might be the best way to determine the breakpoints for the
category definitions; the bigger the structure, the more it can hold before
the label goes up.
I will refrain from guessing how this would affect game-play, though,
and am interested in feedback on that.
--kdc