Buffet tipping

It's always been a debate about the proper tipping amount for a buffet.     You're serving yourself so the 20% thing seems steep.   Historically I'd leave close to that anyway because it wasnt much money empiracly.   Leaving 20% for a $25 buffet was just  $5.     I can part with that without feeling obligated to get philosophical about it being warranted or not.

But in new vegas the buffets are $70....that's $14 per person if you stick with the 20% rule.    No f-ing way am I leaving that much for someone to refill my Coke.   I'm thinking $5 is where I max out on buffet tips.  

where does everyone else stand?   

$5 is a generous tip for any buffet, IMO.   But...sometimes we tip the seater (any restaurant) if we aren't crazy about the first table they show us to, I ask for something else (booth vs table, quieter table, away from the cooking, away from the BR, etc.), and they 'gladly' give us something more to our liking.  Just a few bucks to the buffet seater but they rarely get anything.

Candy

My tips are based on one criteria - the quality of the service. First of all, I am there to eat, I am not there to pay someones salary. I don't/won't have someone else or some printed material dictate the percentage of the total cost of my bill that I am "encouraged" to tip.  My tip reflects my degree of satisifaction with said service. If the food is not up to what I expect, I will not blame the server and I will not stiff them. The server gets only what I feel their service is worth to me. Overtipping for when one receives bad service is counterproductive, in my opinion. 

My criterion (singular of "criteria") is whether I receive prompt drink service, since that's pretty much all the servers do for you. I generally leave 10% if that was done well.

I doubt that I'll ever eat at a $50 buffet, so I won't ever be tipping $5.

Kevin, hit me up when you want to discuss coatings formulations.

I'm assuming you just took a shot, but I'm not smart enough to know what it was.