A fairly simple suggestion. Essentially, if you're in a clockworks run, be it arcade or mission, you can press a button to request help from anyone who's online. The distress signal would essentially be like a reverse party finder, where once you're in a run, you can request help from anyone who's got the distress signal option enabled.

Distress signals will pop up on the side of your screen much like the party finder, and will only activate if you are not currently in an activity (ie, PvP minigames or a run yourself). Restricted and full parties cannot send out distress signals. Only party leaders can activate a distress signal.

This functionality would help higher ranked players find lower ranked parties, and in general allow someone new to the game to better find parties with people. The early game is fairly lonely with rank missions, so a distress signal to help overcome content would give old players something to do when they don't know what to do, and help new players get that community feel earlier on.