Roman Republic Army

Roman Republic STL Miniatures: The Army That Kept Losing and Kept Winning

Most people build Imperial Rome first. It’s the recognisable one: banded armour, rectangular shields, the legion from the films. Then they want to fight Hannibal and discover the army they’ve printed didn’t exist yet, and won’t for another two hundred years.

That’s the gap this collection fills. Republican Rome in 15mm and 28mm, supplied as digital STL files for home printing.

What you get that Imperial doesn’t give you

Opponents, mainly. The Republic fought the enemies that make ancient wargaming interesting: Carthage across three wars including the one Hannibal nearly won, the Hellenistic successor kingdoms with their pike phalanxes, Celtic peoples in northern Italy and Spain, and eventually itself in the civil wars that ended the Republic entirely.

An Imperial legion faces Germanic tribes, Dacians and frontier revolts. Good scenarios, but a narrower set. If you want elephants, sarissas and a general who’s still on the staff college syllabus, you need this army.

The manipular system

Republican Rome fought in three lines and that structure is the whole appeal on a table. Hastati in front, the youngest men. Principes behind them, older and better equipped. Triarii at the back, veterans with spears rather than pila, held as the last resort.

The system worked by rotation: a tired front line fell back through gaps in the ranks behind and fresh men stepped forward. No other ancient army could do that, and it’s why Rome could lose a battle’s opening hour and still be standing at the end of it.

Most battle-scale rulesets model this explicitly, which means a Republican force plays differently from an Imperial one rather than just looking different. You’re managing depth and reserves instead of a single heavy line.

How to tell it apart when you’re buying

Three markers. Mail armour rather than segmented plate. An oval or oblong shield instead of the rectangular curved scutum. And visible variation between figures, because Republican soldiers bought their own equipment according to what they could afford, so a unit looks assembled rather than issued.

Get this wrong and it shows. An Imperial legionary standing next to a Republican one is obviously from a different century to anyone who knows the period.

What else the force needs

Allied contingents, more than anything. Rome’s Republican armies were built on the Italian allies who fought alongside the citizen legions and frequently outnumbered them, plus cavalry, which was never a Roman strength and was usually supplied by somebody else.

The Enemies and Allies collection covers those roles, and the same models often serve on both sides depending on the campaign year.

Printing

Around 0.03mm layer height on resin at either scale, tilted 30 to 45 degrees for drainage. Pila are the fragile part. Mail armour is where the two technologies diverge most visibly: resin captures the ring texture, while FDM tends to smooth it into a surface, so if you’re building a force you’ll paint properly the difference is worth the resin.

Frequently asked questions

Why do figures from different manufacturers look mismatched?
Because nothing standardises how a scale is measured, and sculpting conventions vary between studios. Heroic proportions exaggerate hands, heads and weapons so details read at tabletop distance, while true scale keeps human proportions accurate. Two ranges carrying the same millimetre label can differ noticeably in bulk and height. It matters more in ancient periods than most, because shields are so prominent that a size difference produces an uneven line. Print one test figure and stand it against what you already own before committing to a unit.

How do I paint efficiently when there are forty identical figures?
Batch by step rather than by model. Prime the whole unit, then apply each colour across every figure before moving to the next, then wash the lot together. It’s considerably faster than finishing models one at a time and it produces the consistency a Roman formation needs. Republican armies allow slightly more variation than Imperial ones, since equipment was privately purchased, so you can shift tunic tones between figures without it looking wrong. Do the shields before assembly if the sculpt allows it.

Can I print the same models at a different size?
Yes, scaling is a percentage change in your slicer and it’s one of the practical advantages of digital files over cast metal. Two limits apply. Thin projections such as pila and spear shafts become too fragile to print reliably when scaled down significantly, and any substantial rescale means the supports no longer sit where they should, so you’ll need to re-support. If you’re moving between 15mm and 28mm, use the files sculpted for that scale rather than rescaling, since they’re adjusted for it.

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