Rune Goldberg Machine

"Goldberg" redirects here. For the wizard, see Wizard Goldberg.

This article has a money making guide here. Please add tips to the subpage, rather than the article below.

This article has a calculator here. Calculators determine experience and costs based on real-time prices from the Grand Exchange Market Watch.

This article has a calculator here. Calculators determine experience and costs based on real-time prices from the Grand Exchange Market Watch.

This activity may have associated player-run services, such as Friends Chat channels. Visit the official Minigames and D&Ds forum for more information.

Rune Goldberg Machine

Release date	15 September 2014 (Update)
Area	Runecrafting Guild
Members	Yes
Frequency	Daily
Reset	Hard
Skills	Runecrafting
Currency	Vis wax

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This repeatable content has a hard reset.

The next period's content will become available immediately, regardless of whether a player has logged out.

The Rune Goldberg Machine is a Distraction and Diversion that involves using the Rune Goldberg Machine, invented by Wizard Goldberg, to turn runes into vis wax, a substance with a variety of effects. It is located in the eastern section of the Runecrafting Guild, giving it a requirement of 50 Runecrafting to access.

This activity cannot be reset by a D&D token. It also does not reset when a player is a non-member; if a player completes the activity before their membership expires and becomes a member again later, they must wait until the following reset before the machine could be used again.

Operation

The interface when operating the machine

The Rune Goldberg Machine accepts three different rune types at a time, assigning a different value to each rune. These values are indicative of the efficiency of that rune type when actually used in that slot. It accepts any rune, with the exception of Armadyl runes. These values change daily. Players can insert runes into the machine to see their value, but for every combination tried, the required amount of runes of each of the three types selected will be increased by 0.5% (resets daily). The total value of the runes affects how much vis wax is created. The interface will show red, orange or green dots on the left hand side of the interface depending on whether the rune you have placed in that slot is a bad, an OK or a good match. If the rune you've placed in the machine matches the value of the 'best in slot' rune it will show green. Should the rune have a value of less than 50% then this will show red, and a value that is more than 50% will show orange.

The following table shows the profit and number of runes of a particular type that are required to feed such runes into the machine, assuming the player has obtained the maximum vis wax of the slot (as 0.5% is charged even on the first try). Lastly, it is assumed that vis wax is sold for its medium price: 15,433.

Rune	Base amount	GE Price	Amount per try (rounds down)	Cost per try	Base profit for green in slot 1 or 2	Base profit for green in slot 3
Mud rune	300	260,400	1.5	1,302	201,288	355,618
Astral rune	300	124,500	1.5	622.5	337,867.5	492,197.5
Law rune	300	171,000	1.5	855	291,135	445,465
Soul rune	300	403,500	1.5	2,017.5	57,472.5	211,802.5
Nature rune	350	141,750	1.5	607.5	320,531.25	474,861.25
Blood rune	350	237,300	1.5	1,017	224,503.5	378,833.5
Cosmic rune	400	164,800	2	824	297,366	451,696
Death rune	400	92,800	2	464	369,726	524,056
Dust rune	500	492,500	2.5	2,462.5	−31,972.5	122,357.5
Lava rune	500	483,000	2.5	2,415	−22,425	131,905
Mist rune	500	581,500	2.5	2,907.5	−121,417.5	32,912.5
Smoke rune	500	505,500	2.5	2,527.5	−45,037.5	109,292.5
Steam rune	500	499,500	2.5	2,497.5	−39,007.5	115,322.5
Chaos rune	500	76,000	2.5	380	386,610	540,940
Air rune	1,000	90,000	5	450	372,540	526,870
Water rune	1,000	25,000	5	125	437,865	592,195
Earth rune	1,000	18,000	5	90	444,900	599,230
Fire rune	1,000	159,000	5	795	303,195	457,525
Mind rune	2,000	38,000	10	190	424,800	579,130
Body rune	2,000	96,000	10	480	366,510	520,840

Each of the three slots has a "best" rune, which changes daily. The first slot counts for 30% of the total vis wax, and is the same for every player. The second slot also counts for 30%, and is one of three possible runes (varies from player to player). The final slot counts for 40% of the total amount of wax, and is randomly assigned to each player. If the player has a Runecrafting cape (or a max cape or completionist cape charged with a Runecrafting cape), they can right-click and then activate the cape to see what their daily best rune for slot 3 is.

Just because one of the possibilities is green on the second slot but a player chose the rune that is not green, it does not mean that the rune he/she chose will yield more vis wax than a rune that is not one of the possibilities. For example, say the possibilities of the second rune slot are Death, Soul and Blood. The highest vis wax yield that is not one of the three is Fire (same yield for everyone). A player chose Soul, but it is not green. Soul could either collect more yield than Fire or less.

If Goldberg is asked for help with the machine, he will suggest a particular rune which has been previously shown to him by another player. Be aware that this suggested rune can carry over from the previous day and may not be a good rune anymore if after trying the suggested rune and all combinations for the slots you still have a low amount try swapping the first rune for something else.

The profit (that is, the market value of the vis wax, minus the cost of the runes used) will be greater if experimenting with runes that are fairly cheap, even if you don't get a "100% match". As an extreme example, if the "perfect match" happens to be the three most expensive runes (see the GE prices, in the table above), you may end up spending more, in runes, than what you recover in vis wax. On the other hand, experimenting with combinations of only the six cheapest runes or so, you should be able to get an average profit of about 400k every day.

Trivia

• The name is a reference to Rube Goldberg machines, which are devices or contraptions set up to perform simple tasks in an overly complicated manner. One famous example of this sort of apparatus is the game Mouse Trap, where players can set up their own.