I use the director's cut settings, which disable the consolation Balrog. Didn't care for it.

I leave it on, but it seems that he only comes out the one time when you have hit Gimli saucer 3 times. I find it satisfying to hit him and hear the roar. Plus I have a super bright red LED inside him that adds to him. I actually wish he came out more.

I love seeing the Balrog on the DMD as he roars, while the play field lights up and down with him. I leave my Balrog on during non multiball. TBH i didnt know you could run him off for non multiball play. Keeping it the way it is but i get what you mean, it messes with my flow. But as does the POTD IMO.

Disabled on my LOTR, I don't like it either.

Good point Still keeping it on hehe love the roar too much

Disabled on my LotR

Bash Balrog is lame points, I never shoot it anyway,(too risky) so disable it.
I also disable the Cave Troll free points mode, get right to crossing dudes on the bridge.
"YOU SHALL NOT PASS!"

Wow! I never realized it could be disabled. I friggen hate the Balrog bash, hitting it mostly results in center drains. It will be disabled this evening for certain.

I have director's cut enabled on mine which turns on Cave Troll and disables Bash Balrog.-I figure this is the way that Keith intended the game to be played and I never much cared for the Bash Balrog mode.-feels like an lame add-in similar to the gimme multiball on the 3rd ball of most DE games.

For those of you that do have it enabled give this a try:
first make sure that "consolation balrog is on", then in attract mode:

Both flippers, then Lx6, Rx1, Lx9, Rx1, Lx6, Rx1, Lx9, Rx1. You'll
hear a Balrog roar letting you know you did it right.

Then start a game, and get a consolation balrog (easiest way is to
shoot the cave three times). I won't spoil what it actually does any
more than I already have.

Yah, what's bad on my part is that I've owned mine for 2 years and didn't realize that option.

I have it disabled. Don't like the feature as it seems like an unneeded add on to the Fellowship MB (where the Balrog is utilized perfectly).

I added a plastic deflector at the end of the POTD that makes the ball always end on the habitrail.
This eliminated wear on the arwin plastic and stopped impact wear on the shire plastic/wood.
But the BIG plus is that it improves the flow in this area- instead of two kickers slowing down the game, it is only the POTD kicker. skipping the shire kicker completely!

I also disabled "consolation Balrog"--- Only in the program to attract quarters.

Of course this means that you are also missing out on additional awards of souls.

RobT-
You are very correct-- It really did not make a huge difference to me. (I figure souls were easier to collect then plastic/wood is to replace.) Just thought I would add the option for some. Maybe people have already done this, unfortunately I wasn't a pin nut back when LOTR came out. Did LOTR seem like it would go the distance in popularity/playability when it first came out?

I've got the POTD deflector, and I never really noticed that I was missing any souls. I always seem to get ROTK MB anyway, and I really like the improvement in flow. The drop-off always seemed clunky to me. Plus, no shire protection needed (other than a good waxing once in a while).