I have a problem 
with the word just. If for example you want to remember a list …
consisting of a pear, a television, a car, a wooden table, and a book
… you would not just place them at various locations, you would place them on a predetermined route in your memory palace, so that the predetermined locations on this route would serve as triggers for the information to be recalled.
… or associate them with various points.
If points are just locations, then I don’t understand why you wouldn’t simply say “place in or associate with locations”. If they are in your view different things then I am curious to see an example of a point that is not a location or a location that is not a point.
What if you combine mental images with these predefined elements and then, during recall, use these elements to increase the speed and likelihood of recollection?
The million dollar question in this case would be “Why would this increase the speed and likelihood of recollection?”
Suppose you need to memorize a list consisting of a pear, a television, a car, a wooden table, and a book.
I would probably use the Erol method, Erol who is best known for his viral “The Shaper System” -> Number Shapes - 00 - 99 - Anyone Using It? uses the method of imagining anime arms and legs and faces on simple objects like eggs, apples and pears. So the pear would probably be knocking on the front door of my house screaming “let me in” and the television would be pushing it’s back against the door on the other side saying “ain’t letting no good for nothing pear in my house, not today not ever”.
Now, combine all the items with fire first and then place them in the mind palace.
If you want to make chocolate covered peanuts …
… you don’t put chocolate on the peanuts one at a time with a spoon or brush, but you throw them all in a bucket with melted chocolate. So wouldn’t it not be a lot more economic to simply imagine that the house is on fire. This allows for variation in the sense that not all items have to be on fire, like the pear could be sweating (wiping the sweat off his face) and the tv may be showing a fire related movie.
During recall, the increased details in the images will help you remember better.
That’s not how mnemonics work in my humble opinion. The success of the memory palace is mostly determined by the strength of the connection between a location and the information in that location, not by the amount of details in the images. The recollection of images like a pear and television triggered by thinking of the locations where you placed those items is most likely an illusion; The image of a pear at your front door was never memorized with all it’s details but just the idea that a pear is at that location and this allowed for a reconstruction of an image of a pear.
But what if you suddenly forget the mental image in the living room?
How does one suddenly forget the mental image in the living room? This implies that you could remember the image moments before. Did you also suddenly forget that everything was on fire?
Think about fire.
You tried to memorize a list of items by means of imagining everything being on fire. Like how are you not already thinking about fire?
Imagine fire in the living room …
I thought you were supposed to associate the items with fire first and then place them in the memory palace. But it sounds that you are actually doing what I suggested as a more economic option, namely simply imagine a memory palace that is on fire.
Imagine fire in the living room, and based on my experience, in most cases, the mental image will suddenly come to mind.
You are suggesting that on various occasions you have placed burning images in a burning memory palace and you managed to think about a location without thinking about fire and therefore were not able to see the image you had placed in that location. That’s impossible, unless you are in Wonderland in which cases many impossible things are possible even before breakfast.
This method has another advantage.
I lost count of all the advantages. The idea of using a different theme for different lists of items placed in the same memory palace was discussed on this forum some years ago. Themes like seasons (snow in winter, leaves in the fall and so on), dirty vs clean, Halloween or christmas atmosphere and so on were suggested. I believe the conclusion of that discussion was that even if it is theoretically possible it would require so much effort for it to work it’s not worth the trouble.
I have a feeling you don’t actually believe in this method as much as the enthusiasm with which you articulate all the possible advantages would indicate. The potential of this method can easily be tested by simply doing this:
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memorize a list of items using 100 locations;
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memorize another 100 items using 50 locations; one item is on fire the other one isn’t.
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compare results (speed and accuracy).
It is my educated guess that you haven’t made much effort in testing the method in a way that would give an objective qualification of its strength.