Here is a thought.... why not pull sufficient power to give you a positive rate of climb, but not so much that you are lifting off like the space shuttle.....
I spend a good portion of my flight time inside the H/V curve, and am frequently conducting confined area operations. There is no "Book" way to do it, do what feels right for the prevailing conditions. You all know what feels right---you just need to learn to "feel it" and go with it.
If you maintain smooth control inputs, understand the basics and then adjust them accordingly. I could not tell you how much power I am pulling over hover power, other than I am not red-lining, my eyes are looking outside where they should be. I would hazard a guess that it is somewhere around 10% above hover power.
Incidentally, gauges are color coded for a reason.....on some of my aircraft we have extra critical gauges installed in the door frame arm rest, so that under "normal" conditions the needles will all point the same way----this allows for quick glances at the gauges without having to read the numbers.