No not unless you have another card that lets you.
You hand only refreshes at the end of your turn norrmaly.
Yeah, I've found that many turns start with no cards in a player's hands if they've been generous with giving a card, or more specifically, helping others with blessings and other powers.
That's is probably why at least 2 characters have powers on their role cards to draw a card at the start of their turn; Harsk and Sajan.
Who are you guys playing as?
If you're having issues don't be afraid to ask for help - when I tried out the game Christmas day with my family we failed Bringandoom twice, mostly because we weren't utilizing the characters' special powers enough - those are really important.
I'm also finding that my friends are becoming stingy with helping others. I'm not sure if it's a human nature thing or what, but less often are people willing to recharge, or especially discard a card to help someone else's roll. I think part of it is they don't want empty or handicapped hands when it gets to their turns.
My friend who's taken a long time to get a grasp on the rules plays Harsk. Nearly every combat, I have to "suggest" that he recharge a card to shoot an arrow to help out. I don't think he's ever once offered that power or a blessing on his own. And he my be the worst, but not the only one.
Keep with it. Its loads of fun. Allies often allow you to explore too.
Keep in mind you don't have to permanently close every location. You can temporarily close locations when you encounter the villain. If defeat the villain and all the other locations are either permanently or temporarily closed, you win. Not sure that you didn't already know that, but just wanted to offer that clarification in case you did not.
If you think you might still need some help figuring out how to play, there are a bunch of youtube videos. This one is particularly good I think. They make some mistakes, but usually explain in a side interview what that mistake was and what they should have done.
I'm of the opinion that any group of character 3+ can succeed. But if you mix of skills you'll be a bit better off. Your two groups actually seem sell mixed. Maybe the second better than the first. You might want to consider dropping Merisiel for Seoni to get some Arcane (Ezren is awesome but tricky to play). You could drop Valeros for Seoni instead, but given he was in both groups, I'm guessing someone really wants to be him. But most of all, everyone should pick the character they will have the most fun playing.
I'm also finding that my friends are becoming stingy with helping others. I'm not sure if it's a human nature thing or what, but less often are people willing to recharge, or especially discard a card to help someone else's roll. I think part of it is they don't want empty or handicapped hands when it gets to their turns.
My friend who's taken a long time to get a grasp on the rules plays Harsk. Nearly every combat, I have to "suggest" that he recharge a card to shoot an arrow to help out. I don't think he's ever once offered that power or a blessing on his own. And he my be the worst, but not the only one.
I know exactly what you mean about this - In my 2 player Valeros/Lini game with my brother I took weapon as my first card feat on Lini. But, in the scenario leading up to that my brother had acquired a spiked chain. So this gave us an extra weapon, meaning that I had to take one of his weapons rather than being able to take my new weapon from the box. I wasn't too worried because he had the deathbane light crossbow, which isn't the best roll for Valeros anyway. However when it came down to it and I mentioned this to my brother he just sort of gave me a look and said something about how giving Lini the deathbane would be a "waste" and tossed me the spiked chain. I told him that this was a useless weapon for me since it requires proficiency or you take a difficulty check penalty but he didn't care.
What made it even worse was that on the very next mission he started with the deathbane in his hand and the first thing he said was "we should meet up so I can give you this"....
At least in your case it might be an unintentional aspect to people still learning the rules.
We did it! We had Valeros, Lini, and Amiri. We finished Brigandoom! Then we finished Pillbox first try. We closed all locations on Black Fang, and Lini uncovered him on the last blessing card. Needless to say, we lost that one! There were no cards or powers we had to help out the poor little Druid. It was sadness all around, but we are ready to go after him again!
Thanks for your help!!
Ouch. Yeah combat is not her strength, especially at the beginning. When I played with Valeros I kept him and Lini at the same location alot early on so she'd get the +1d4 from him unless there was somewhere that was super easy (low monster/barrier count/no bad powers) in which case I'd send her there instead. One really good card that I kept on her for awhile was the Sanctuary spell - basically if she ran into a monster she couldn't handle she could just Sanctuary it and have someone else come and deal with it. Also makes pairing with Valeros at a more monster-heavy location more feasible.
Good luck - glad you're enjoying it.