An interesting thread.
I concur with the distaste for black hat checkie multi-faceted loading up of the crew - pointless.
However, following on from dweeks' post,
I know one guy who had manual reversion, one engine generator working, the other engine inop, and then the slats/flap were stuck at 1.
his comment brings up a memory.
I was a neophyte 727 FO on my first trip in the sim post checkout. Old greybeard checkie being done by one of his mates in the back seat. Did all the scripted stuff and then the brief was "nil hazard play time". By the time he got back on final, there was very little working. At the final failure, still barely raising a sweat, he casually turned to the FE and politely asked if that worthy might be able to find time to do one or two things for the failure .. and then proceeded to run down the ILS to a nice touchdown. By this stage my jaw was on the floor and to say I was somewhat in awe would be an understatement.
The point of the tale is that there can be some value to be had in a briefed nil hazard environment so that folks might be prepared to extend themselves a little bit with the ability to call time out if necessary. Certainly, as an instructor, I have found that approach to be useful with underconfident trainees who just needed some low stress time to play with the thing and get themselves into the groove, as it were. Likewise, for the talented end of the gene pool, the approach can help to push the trainee to a position well above the required bar.
But, with any pressure associated with "check" time, it doesn't work. One needs to be able to segregate checking, formal training, and informal exposure/practice to best exploit the generally underused capabilities of the sim toys we have available at our disposal.
Just my heretical thoughts, I guess.