Coincidentally, I just stayed at the 11 Howard and the JW and was wondering what I'm missing by not staying at the StR or RC. StR on points looks like it's 12000ish more per night than the JW.

I wrote up my experiences on my blog for both hotels: JW Marriott Essex House Review | NYC ? Asian Insanity

Upgrades to junior suite both times.

I'm GenX and loved the 11 Howard but -- only ~3 devices could connect to the hotel network at once. I had 2 laptops (work, personal), ipad, iphone; son had phone, Switch; wife had ipad, iphone. Didn't even hook up my Firestick. For a millennial/tech type, that is CRAZY. Maybe it was a network setting, we stayed one night and I was out the next day.

We stayed 10-12 nights at the Essex over two visits, on points, and I didn't have enough to do that at the StR (and still fund my Japan trip this summer).