I'm pretty much in line with what OHMARK said. To his point about Marriot Packages, here is an example. For 200,000 MR Points, you get 7 nights in a Cat 6 hotel and 70,000 FF miles. Using Hawaii in this example, you can get the same 7 nights in the JW Ihilani, a Cat 6, (nicest hotel in all of Hawaii in my opinion) for 130,000. Flying to Hawaii on AA points is 35,000 for a coach class reward (book early, they go fast). So, for your 200,000 points on a package deal, you get the 7 nights in a cat 6 (130,000 pts), and 2 round trip tickets to Hawaii with the 70,000 pts. A much better value than converting MR points straight into miles.

I have carried a MR card for about 8 years and have carried a AA Advantage card for about 2 years. At this time, I use each card of different things. For the most part, I use the MR card to pay for hotels when I stay at Marriot properties because the points are better and use my AA card for almost everything else. I have a corporate card my company makes me carry (a GE MasterCard, which is really a bad deal), but I only use it for company car rentals because of some insurance issues if I don't.

There may be some better deals for some hotel reward programs, but I am loyal to Marriott because they have treated me more than fair over the years. I have had them give me as many as 10,000 points just for being a little inconvenienced during a stay. I can't say the same of some other programs which I belong to.