CAST: Count Tildanor the Rog
| NAME: | Count Tildanor |
| AGE: | Unknown |
| RACE: | Maia - Valarauko or Balrog |
| PROFESSION: | Part troubadour a capella baritone, part wandering monster |
| WORLD OF ORIGIN: | Middle-earth, Second Age |
| FIRST APPEARANCE: | Monster Mash - Part One |
Count Tildanor is a Balrog. In other words, he is a large (2.5 metre) humanoid monster, part fire, part shadow, entirely terrifying. His own shadow reflects his mood and power: when enraged, it spreads like wings, although he cannot fly and is actually rather scared of heights ('reaciial nenory', he explains); most of the time, it resembles a long black cloak. He has large fiery eyes and cat-like ears, although his face is so shrouded in darkness as to be scarcely visible. The effect of all this is enhanced by a booming baritone voice, but is rendered rather less potent by his choice of footwear: pink fluffy slippers. He can't remember where, when or why he acquired these, but they are comfy enough for him to not really worry about it, and no-one else dares ask.
Born early in the Second Age of Middle-earth (via a process thankfully unknown) the Count is young by Balrog standards, which may explain his slightly more enlightened attitude to life. Destructive nihilism has attenuated into petulance and impulsiveness, which are still rather unpleasant when the creature in question is a powerful demon, but do not hinder his interacting with races other than his own - albeit not very well. Awareness of his own social standing as a created being of the first order means that he treats most creatures with barely-disguised contempt unless he has a very good reason not to; this hauteur has landed him in trouble on several occasions.
Unlike most Balrogs, he has mastered the art of Incarnate speech, if somewhat idiosyncratically: he jumbles words and sounds so drastically that it is not always easy to divine his meaning. He prefers to attribute this habit to 'Tyope', a divinity he attempted to introduce to the land of Mezzobaritonellamanyahnyah while undertaking a lecture tour on comparative religions. Fearful that this was a front for Morgoth-worship, the people there drove him out and thus deprived him of a steady income and the means of winning the heart of his immortal beloved. A hopeless romantic and opera lover, the Count consoled himself by singing wistful arias and torching homesteads, until he resolved to discover the legendary CHOKLIT mines and make his fortune that way. This plan fell through when the Count encountered the Rift - and fell through that as well...
For more information on Tildanor's upbringing and early life, go to Out for the Count in the World section of the website.
The Count first entered our story in the middle of a rather fraught situation, namely the desperate ambush laid by Paganini, Morwen and Karlingalas for the monstrous Zorag the Barbarian using Jared as bait. Furthermore, the Shadow Guy had previously used a phantom Balrog in an attempt to intimidate the group in the depths of the Castle Hare Library, so the party naturally paid him little heed until the combat resolved itself into a duel between Zorag and Paganini. The Count was prevailed upon to assist by absorbing the ring of flame surrounding the combatants that was giving Zorag added strength, and thus enabled Jared to sneak in and play a vital role in the defeat of the monster. In the aftermath, he agreed to assist the heroes in their ongoing struggle to vanquish the western army, albeit for the rather non-heroic reasons that Zorag and his companions had got on his nerves and that he is developing a mild crush on Morwen. This new addition to the group put an even greater strain on the working relationship between Morwen, Jared and Karlingalas than previously existed. To his dismay, the Count discovered that his powers are rather less considerable than they used to be, to the extent that he is being put out by scattered showers, but nonetheless he and the others attacked the camp of Zorag's army and caused considerable confusion and destruction. The Count was humiliatingly reduced in size after being thoroughly soaked, but nonetheless escaped, only to find that Morwen was missing. He and Jared tracked Morwen down, but they both feel that there is something distinctly odd about her, and the resulting argument grew rather heated. They recovered Paganini to discover that Karlingalas had taken off with the Knife of Glaneth, and on their way back to the Castle encountered Lord Graham proceeding in the opposite direction in rather a hurry. Tildanor's simmering resentment at Morwen's treatment of him boiled over, and he stormed off declaring that he would brun dwon teh Tascle nad veryhnitg nii t. Eventually mollified, he and the others came to Castle Hare undertook a mission to eliminate the rebel faction. To his discomfiture, these 'rebels' include a wizard (Rakeis). To his even greater discomfiture, when he very reluctantly descended an abyss, he found yet another wizard (the Wizard With No Name), and a being whose nature is a total mystery to him (Warren). Forced to behave with something approaching respect for the first time in a very long while, the Count, Rakeis, Warren, Morwen, Lord Adam and the returned Karlingalas have departed on yet another attempt to discover what on earth they're all doing here.
| FITNESS: | Superb | FOCUS: | Poor | PERSONALITY: | Average |
| CO-ORDINATION: | Average | INTELLECT: | Good | APPEARANCE: | Putz |
| QUICKNESS: | Average | WITS: | Poor |
| Music (vocal): | Legendary | Combat (whip): | Good | |
| Mastery of fire: | Superb | Aerial agility: | Putz | |
| Dark magics: | Good |