Well, international is the problem, at least in your example.

The issue is that the hotel families that you think of as "major" from the US are not necessarily major overseas. Hilton has lots of lower-cost hotels in the US, but they're generally flagged as Hamptons, Hilton Garden Inns, etc. These brands until lately haven't existed overseas at all, and since they only recently started adding these overseas they're still very spotty. So all you find in the family in many overseas locations is the top-end brands.

So, yes, if your 100+ nights a year are mostly in places like that, then you've answered your own question. But if they're mostly in places where there's a cheap Hampton Inn, and you earn all your points there, and then can spend those points at an expensive Hilton or Conrad overseas, well, that may be different.

It also depends a lot on what you look for, and who you are. For example, a tall person may value airline status much more than a short person. If you value airline status a lot, in turn, you quite likely value it more than hotel status. If OTOH you don't see as much value in airline status (say, because you're shorter, or because your flying patterns mostly put you on RJs where airline status does little for you), then as a matter of elimination you may value hotel status more.

Furthermore, each hotel chain has a "sweet spot" of status, beyond which there's less benefit for many. Right now, HH seems to have that at Gold. So if all your stays are one night each (the optimimum in terms of both earning status and earning bonus points/miles at most hotel chains), then you can hit HH Gold at 16 stays, Priority Club Platinum in 60k points in a dozen or so stays (if you time it for the best bonuses, some of the most lucrative ones you only find on FT), and then can still do Choice Diamond at 40 nights (Choice hotels are particularly inexpensive in the US, but have fantastic redemption rates in some countries overseas, and Diamond there gives you first crack at those) and have oodles of nights left over.

Meanwhile, if you meant you stay 3 weeks at a time in Bali, then you need to know that most all hotel chains "punish" you in the points/miles department for extended stays. (Like I said, one night-stays are the optimal in almost all points/miles/status-earning cases: "hotel hopping" if necessary.)

Anyway, as some one who has lots of stays on my own dime, I do indeed find HH to have priced itself out of my range most of the time. I can just manage to usually requalify for Gold by looking for weeks when rates drop or by using HH when I travel to those rarer (usually "smaller") locations where they're reasonably priced. It is HH's pricing itself higher that led me to concentrate more on bonus-rich-at-lower-cost-stays Priority Club and Choice Priveleges. However, I need to point out that pretty much all my earning is in the US, and but most of my burning is overseas. (Choice Priveleges doesn't allow you to earn in many countries outside North America yet.)

But the problem I have with HH is not just the price, but the lack of bonuses. It means I earn reward nights at HH more slowly than at other chains. (And because HH is the one chain where reward nights count toward status, I sometimes rely on reward nights to maintain status. But that's unsustainable in the long term!!!)