I saw the same "depreciation" with Marriott- about a year ago they expanded their hotel classifications from 2 to 4 or 5 and most of the points needed for the more desirable hotels (one I checked was the Bidapest Marriott) were raised.

Life is too short to wait till retirement to
redeem reward travel. I'm 49. My fiance is
63. We're grabbing all the gusto we can while still holding down our jobs.