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The Contingency is one of the three Endgame Crises that may arise to threaten the entire galaxy in Stellaris. They seek to prevent a technological singularity by eliminating any species capable of creating sentient AI. This insidious threat constantly attempts to hack AI-powered technology and turn it against its creators, making it a particular headache for robot-heavy empires and Machine Intelligences.
Like every Crisis, the galaxy gets a warning shortly before the Contingency appears. By recognizing the signs and preparing accordingly, you can turn the tables on them and shut down the Contingency once and for all.
How To Predict The Contingency
The Contingency can potentially appear any time after the Endgame Year set at the beginning of the campaign; by default, the Endgame Year is 2400. The more time passes after the Endgame Year, the more likely a Crisis will be to spawn. Only one Crisis can appear in a campaign, so if a different one appears you won't have to deal with the Contingency.
The Contingency will first make itself known by sending every empire an event alerting them to the presence of the Ghost Signal. Machine empires and any empires with Synthetic pops (regular Synths or those created through the Synthetic Ascension path) will each see a single pop mysteriously disappear each year. These empires receive their first events two years before everyone else, giving them more time to prepare.
If your empire does not have any Synthetic or Machine population, you'll be notified of the Ghost Signal two years after the first disappearance. Two years after that, the Contingency's forces will begin to appear on the map.
How To Prepare For The Contingency
In the time between the Ghost Signal's appearance and that of the first Contingency ships, the best way to prepare is to refit your navy to fight the Crisis. Remove any Armor and put as many Shields on your ships as you can - the Contingency only uses energy weapons, so Shields are your best defense. If you can, research more advanced Shields and Reactor techs to handle the extra power draw from the updated defenses.
Contingency ships have exceptional defenses, both in terms of Armor and Shields, so you'll need a balanced combination of weapon types to defeat them in battle. Alternately, if you have access to advanced Disruptors, these weapons are excellent against the Contingency since they ignore Armor and Shields.
If you have the appropriate Technology, avoid using Sentient Combat AI in your ships as the Contingency will inflict a large debuff on your fleet if you have them. You may be tempted to outlaw AI and scrap your existing Synthetics, but this is a bad idea. Doing so runs the risk of triggering a robot uprising, giving you an additional threat to deal with during a Galactic Crisis. Contingency vulnerability is simply an inherent risk that goes hand-in-hand with the benefits of having Synthetics in your empire.
Infiltration Events
The Contingency will attempt to infiltrate empires by replacing people with Synthetic duplicates. Every year during the Crisis these infiltrators will cause a detrimental event, from destroying buildings and killing pops to making attempts on your Ruler's life. It may even turn out that key Leaders within your empire have been replaced by Synths, necessitating their immediate removal.
After the first few infiltration events, you'll receive a special project in the Situation Log that allows you to detect infiltrators before they can do any damage. Completing the project ensures that no further infiltration events will take place in your empire, and earns the Voight-Kampff Achievement/Trophy.
How To Defeat The Contingency
Once the Contingency begins its purge of the galaxy, it will begin to spawn fleets from five Sterilization Hubs scattered across the map. Each hub will spawn a new fleet every four to five years, and a new invasion army every two to three years. These forces will attempt to invade any inhabited planets they encounter, wiping out the population of those they successfully occupy.
The Ghost Signal will continue to interfere with Sentient Fleet AI and mechanical pops, imposing an enormous penalty on their capabilities. This penalty is reduced with each Sterilization Hub that is destroyed, so unaffected empires should try to destroy as many Hubs as they can quickly to allow their robotic allies to join the fight.
Machine Intelligence empires can undertake a special project from the Situation Log to block the Ghost Signal. The project requires an investment of Engineering Research based on the total affected population, but once complete it permanently protects your empire from the Ghost Signal's penalties.
The Sterilization Hubs are heavily defended, but each one destroyed will weaken the Contingency. Not only will they have fewer spawn points for their military forces, but the time between new fleets and armies will lengthen with each Hub that is removed.
Although Sterilization Hubs are planets, they cannot be invaded. Instead, they must be bombarded from orbit until their Devastation reaches fifty, at which point the Hub is permanently shut down. Keep your ground armies planetside on critical planets to fight off any Contingency invasions.
Contingency fleets are immune to FTL inhibitors, making it impossible to trap them. A powerful enough Starbase can still repel a Contingency fleet through conventional force of arms, especially with assistance from your navy.
When the last Sterilization Hub is destroyed, the Contingency's home system will be revealed somewhere on the outskirts of the galaxy. Sending a fleet to this heavily-defended system and bombarding their homeworld of Nexus Zero One will destroy the Contingency forever. Any Contingency fleets in the galaxy will be immediately destroyed once Nexus Zero One falls. The player that destroys Nexus Zero One will earn the Does Not Compute Achievement/Trophy for successfully stopping the Contingency.