I've never heard of anybody tipping the tank. Good mana users will be chugging potions anyway if it's at all a tough fight, which makes them spend about the same gold. Also I think rogues may spend some money on some stuff too like poisons, not sure how that adds up.

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A 150-250gp fee for a raiding level rent-a-tank is pretty standard for us. Makes things mind numbing easy to have a well geared tank than can actually do it.

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Because tanks don't use consumables? pshaw. The good ones will always be prepared with them and won't be afraid to use them if the situation merits it.

As a tank, I do not expect a tip. I've turned them down in plenty though..both from guildies and from puggers.

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I know when I was playing my warrior I never got tipped for armor repairs or anything like that. I hardly got a thanks either.

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I'll start tipping a tank the day people pay me for food & water.

You picked your class -- not me. Suck it up, meat-shield.

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I feel almost like a spoiled child reading this article and thinking to myself "what a dumb idea! what did they ever do for... oh yeah." But no, can't say i have ever tipped a tank tho. However I have thrown some gold their way if the group is suuuuucking and wipes galore is upon us, especially if i do something completely dumb.

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I never tip the tank, I never pay for the reagents of mages for their table, I don't pay hunters to use better bullets or for food to keep their pets at top happiness levels, i don't pay rogues for applying poisons, I don't pay any class to use their reagents for the group buffs, I don't tip warlocks for stones, I don't ...

Need I go on? All classes have something that costs them money or time. Why one class deserves a tip over another (implying that they are more worthy) is beyond me.

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I have never been tipped as a tank, ever.

Generally, you're gonna get loot or something from just running it right?

I dunno. I've never heard of this, but I'd definitely run a lot more PUG's if I knew that the rest of the group was going to help on my 15-30g+ repair bill if we wipe a lot. Probably more of a raid PUG thing rather than a 5-man thing, but heroics can go sour really quick too. I only run the heroic daliy quest, because I know that as long as we don't wipe more than 7 times, I'm going to have my repair bill covered by the daily quest cash. Raids, I figure that I'm at least going to get one drop over the course of the raid (and as a tank, you can usually assume that loot will go your way before most other classes, if only because you are a tank and on most servers you're in high demand and short supply).

I think tipping in this game is a bit absurd in general anyway.

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Depends. I would never expect anything from guildies in the form of tips while tanking an instance. But if you PST me at 3am and plead for a tank for your pickup group, then I'm going to fully play the role of mercenary and ask "What's in it for me?". A lot of times people will ask you to OT because their guild is one short for an instance and you totally get stiffed on drops and other fat loot. So if you're not even going to say thanks, at least have the courtesy to say it with gold. Especially if I saved your butts often. For the most part, even in PuG situations it isn't expected but it is always appreciated, just like it is in other professions. This seldom happens and I agree with epsilon343 that in those situations you hardly ever even get a simple thank you. Which is why many tanks when asked to be mercenaries in PuGs "just say no".

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I play Tank myself (Pally tank) and I have never come accross anyone that has ever tipped (or been tipped) as a tank.

Now yes I used to tip for water now and again (however since the table of refreshment I havent shelled out a copper) and now and again I will tip rouges for opening lock boxes for me if I get anything good but I dont see the point in tipping or expecting a tip as a tank.

Usually when im in a run im 90% of the time going to get a large prismatic shard out of it (I have a team I usually go with and we devided the shards as even as we can one each roll for any extra or if theres not enough roll and the higest gets them (aka 3 shards higest 3 rolls win one each) which sells for an easy 25G so that covers the repair

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I think this is a relevant issue, especially when seeing how modern pvp works.
A warrior has to be prot to tank and he has to be arms/fury to do anything in arenas.
So a warrior that wants to do both spends tons of cash respeccing. I think most raiding warriors are at the respeccing cap and using it at least a few days weekly.
Instances like ZA sets quite high requirements for the MT for it to go smoothly, so paying a t6 geared warrior to respec prot might save you a lot of gold on repairs compared to bringing a tank with only t4 for example :)
But do we want tanks to start acting like mercenaries benefitting from the fact that there is always too few of them?
I think instead blizzard should make repaircosts the same on all armortypes and perhaps nerf the costs of respeccing. And perhaps even make some pvpfriendly tanking builds :)

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Interesting question. I have never received a tip for being the MT in the group. Nor do I expect to receive one.

One thing to consider is that being a warrior you don't have constant upkeeps like other class except the repair bill. So it is in your best interest to keep your equipment in good shape.

http://doctorsofphilosophy.blogspot.com/

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The tip for the tank's repair bill is the loot they pick up/win. Just like the loot is my lock's repair bill and time for shard farming. Or the cost of reagents for the priest/mage/shammy/etc, or the hunter's ammo.

The only time I'd consider tipping a tank is if I hire a merc tank to do an raid.

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