Telly Savalas wasn't just my first Blofeld, but my first Bond villain. Of the three Blofelds we actually see in the official series, he's the one closest to a physical match for Bond, and he's an effective villain. The problem is he seems like a very different character from the "scarred asexual monster" played by Donald Pleasance in YOLT. He's definitely not asexual - his appreciation of Tracy is obvious! Then again the urbane and rather camp Blofeld of DAF is definitely different from the one in OHMSS, although he too had an eye for a pretty body as well!
And therein lies the problem - one villain, three different actors playing him in three different ways in three successive films. Only the Persian cat remains constant. Having said that, in the novels Fleming himself created Blofeld as something of a changeling - the obese boss of Thunderball replaced by the slimmed down "aristocrat" of OHMSS, then replaced by the deranged armour clad lunatic of You Only Live Twice.
My "Blofeld"? In the official series, I "like" all three, but they all seem like different personalities who happen to share the same name. As for Max Von Sydow in NSNA - he is criminally underused in the film, but he seems to play the part like a benign uncle who just happens to have stolen some cruise missiles. Oddly enough, according to the book "The Making of On Her Majesty's Secret Service", he was seriously considered for the part of Blofeld. Maybe then he would have fitted the role better.
One last point - I can't help wondering what Jan Werich, the "original" Blofeld of YOLT, would have done with the role.