Hybrid Colony Designations

This mod introduces custom colony designations that blend vanilla resource focuses into unique and efficient dual-role settlements.

• 15 new hybrid designation archetypes + 28 thematic variants, including:
  • Energy + Minerals + Food – Rural World, back from the dead
  • Research + Unity – Similar to the "Archive" district specialization
  • Basic Resources + Unity – One for each basic resource. Production and community.
  • Basic Resources + Trade – One for each basic resource. Production and logistics.
  • Minerals + Advanced Resources – One for each advanced resource. Vertical mining and manufacturing.
  • Focused Research + Basic Resources – One for each matched pair, like the "research support" districts
  • Build Speed + Resettlement Pull + Amenities – A transitional designation for new colonies
  • …and more!
• Twice the bonuses at half the potency for balanced but versatile colony roles
• Fully localized for: English, Español, português (Europeu), português brasileiro, Українська, Русский, 简体中文, Français, Deutsch, and Polski
• Works fine with a mid-game install. At least for me.
• Designed for compatibility and immersion in a vanilla+ setting

In the early stages of the game, full planetary specialization isn’t always realistic. You’re often working with whatever bonuses the galaxy throws at you you – sometimes a mix of mineral output, trade boosts, and scattered deposits that don’t neatly align with a single designation.

Hybrid designations are made for those kinds of worlds. They support planets with multiple or mismatched bonuses, letting you take advantage of what’s available without leaving potential on the table. Rather than forcing a strict economic identity, these designations provide flexibility and meaningful bonuses for mixed development.

They’re especially useful for empires playing tall or managing just a handful of colonies, where each planet needs to perform across multiple economic roles. Hybrid designations also make adaptation easier, allowing you to pivot as your needs evolve, whether you’re scaling up mineral output, boosting unity, or responding to shifting strategic priorities. And for those with a strong RP vision, these designations can reinforce the kind of worldbuilding you have in mind.

Hybrid designations won’t solve everything, but they allow you to work with what you have and still get solid results.

• AI empires won’t use these. That’s on purpose. Balancing for AI selection introduces more opportunities for unexpected consequences than something this niche could justify. That said, weighting for automated colony designation was implemented.
• Does not support automated build queues*. I have not written an AI build plan for these designations. This is doable, but not currently on the project map. For now, only use this mod if you intend to manually set your build queues.
• Return of some old friends. The "Rural World" and "Fringe Planet" designations are the same, or as close as I could manage, as the designations that were in the game before 4.x removed them. "Colonial Outpost" is as close as the current engine allows me to get to the old "Colony" designation.
• Access limitations are inherited. Hybrid designations honor the restrictions of their vanilla parents. For example, Farming designations are unavailable to empires that don’t consume food, so the Rural World (which combines Farming along with Mining and Energy) will be restricted accordingly.
• Bonuses are balanced. Each designation is tuned to roughly match an average of the bonuses from the vanilla designations it fuses. You’re usually still better off if you can fully specialize.

* I have added experimental AI build plans for Rural and Grange. Unsupported. Seems flaky. Use at your own risk. Which has always been the case with using automated build queues.

• Not Iron Man Achievements Compatible – This mod alters gameplay mechanics, which is its entire point.
• No DLC required – Designations from official DLC (like MegaCorp) will only appear if you own the corresponding content, but the mod runs cleanly either way.
• Vanilla-safe implementation – Does not overwrite any base game files. All designations are added via standalone scripted triggers, ensuring compatibility with Stellaris updates.
• Required Mods – HCD relies heavily on the Universal Modifier Patch.
• Load order recommendations – Place below major overhauls (like Gigastructural Engineering, ACOT, or NSC). Place above UI mods or visual tweaks – they don’t interact with designations.
• Mod triggered effects may skip hybrids. Traditions or events from mods that reference specific designations (like how Adaptability gives technicians a bonus on Energy Designation planets) may not affect hybrid colonies unless manually patched by you or another modder. The vanilla ones, however, are baked in.

HCD has reached it maximum ideal size, in regard to archetypes. I want to keep it relatively slim with options that apply to the broadest player base. Going beyond 15 archetypes (in addition to the vanilla selection) would bloat the UI in ways most players would not appreciate. I will, however, continue to release new Thematic Variants (which don’t increase overall designation menu item count), and I’d also like to eventually get AI build plans implemented. Bug fixes and version updates go without saying. For the players who believe that too much of a good thing is awesome, I have released a companion mod dedicated to edge cases, role-playing, and creative min-maxing. HCDX is proudly niche and will probably have a narrow appeal, but if you’re hungry for a little more, well, there it is.

Hybrid Colony Designations – For Planets That Multitask Better Than You Do!

HCD 2.0.0 reorganized (renamed, split, or removed) several files for maintainability. No internal IDs changed, so backwards-compatibility was retained. However, Steam doesn’t auto-delete old files. If you downloaded HCD before July 13, 2025, you may see harmless duplicate entries or error log clutter. To fix that, simply unsubscribe, and launch Stellaris to purge the old files, then re-subscribe and relaunch for a clean 2.x install.

All of my mods – across all platforms and games – are released with fully open permissions. You are free to:

• Re-use, modify, or build upon any original scripts, graphics, or concepts
• Re-upload or redistribute them anywhere
• Rename or reattribute them as you see fit

No need to ask, credit, or notify me. These projects are just something I do for fun, and I want others to enjoy and remix them freely.