Used to with a sailboat, all the time. Took a while to become comfortable enough with controlling the boat, though, before I started doing it regularly.
MUCH easier with a sailboat.
- A sailboat has a rudder that actually works in at "ghosting" speeds, in forward or reverse
- A sailboat with a fin keel will pivot around its keel instead of "drift"
- A sailboat typically has much less "sail" area than a large cruiser.
To the OP, every boat is different. Typically, the rudders on a power cruiser are small and ineffective at slow speeds, particularly in reverse. As psneed points out (he has years more operational experience than I ever will) pulsing the engine can do a couple of things. The first effect is it will tend to kick the stern in the direction of the prop walk, typically to port in reverse, starboard in forward. In my boat, I get more pronounced prop walk in reverse. The second thing it does is to increase flow over the rudder, making it effective for the length of the power pulse. On my boat, this is much more effective when the pulse is in forward.
If you can spin your rudder fast enough, you can use this to move your stern to port or starboard as you back in. Going slowly, rudder hard to port, pulsing the power will mover your stern to port. Rudder hard to starboard, a power pulse will move your stern to starboard.
I wish my boat had a jog lever, it would make this much easier.