In the middle of a long war of conquest in Total War: Three Kingdoms, I suddenly find myself unable to attack any enemy settlements or armies. I can walk right up to their armies and right-click on them, and the game makes some acknowledgement sound (dialogue from the leading general) but does nothing. When I'm in enemy territory, my armies have a little icon next to them marked "Trespassing."
The usual cause of confusion about this in Total War is entering March stance (which boosts movement but prevents attacking), but I'm well aware of the associated UI elements (stance indicator and a "can't attack" warning on the mouseover popup), and that's not the cause of the problem here.
What's happening and how do I fix this?
(I am playing the OS X version.)
1 Answer
Sigh.
I did a bunch of further research and found this bug report: "Can't attack Yuan Shao's settlements [Updated - Bug can be recreated]"
When you're fighting an alliance and it dissolves because a faction was eliminated, the game may mess up your war status with the remaining members.
This has been suggested as a temporary workaround:
For whatever reason this bug is flipping your war status. If you make peace with any faction you are having this bug with you will then be able to attack them. It won't tell you to declare war, it won't show you're at war on the diplomacy screen, their color will remain grey on the map for the rest of the game, and you also won't be able to call any allies or vassals to arms against them.
