Earlier this week, The Division 2 players were disappointed to learn that the upcoming Operation Dark Hours raid will not support matchmaking, despite developer Massive Entertainment’s claim that all activities would offer the feature. For many, this meant that they simply would not be able to experience the Division 2 raid, while others are trying to come up with in-game solutions that might help them group up with players.

Over on the Division 2 subreddit, players are discussing various ways to implement their own form of matchmaking in order to find a group for the Operation Dark Hours raid. Because the raid supports up to 8 players, it’s going to be difficult to gather 7 friends if you don’t already have a group or clan ready to go. However, this early solution sounds smart and could work, if enough players get the message.

How to Find Players for The Division 2 Raid

What the forum is suggesting is that players head to the yellow helicopter in the White House social hub as a meet-up place. It's there for the raid anyway, so it can serve as a type of group finder location. Players should head to the helicopter and start doing the jumping jacks emote as a way to let others know they would like to participate in the Operation Dark Hours raid. If enough players all spot each other doing jumping jacks then they can group up and hopefully, start the raid.

By no means is this is an ideal situation, but it could work. Of course, there are outside LFG (Looking For Group) services that are bound to become popular because of Division 2’s lack of matchmaking, but those require going outside of the game to find players.

No question, the announcement about no raid matchmaking was disappointing for Division 2 players. Most expected there to be matchmaking and to make the announcement so unceremoniously (via a Twitter reply) and without much notice is sure to be a blow to those who hoped to check out the new content tomorrow.

Massive’s decision not to allow raid matchmaking does make sense, though, as the raid likely includes elements that need coordination and teamwork, as can be seen in the Division 2 raid trailer. Bungie didn’t allow matchmaking in Destiny’s raids for that same reason, but they also prepared players ahead of time. For Division 2, many players are scrambling to find a group and our now resorting to in-game meeting places in order to find 7 other raid teammates.

Division 2’s Operation Dark Hours raid release May 16th for PC, PS4, and Xbox One.