My mother-in-law is a member of their MVC. Is it possible for them to help me book a 5 day hotel n flight pckg with my account and points?

So seems to me, based on the new award chart (which becomes effective August), for people currently holding a Cat 1-5 7 night certificate, those just became extremely more valuable. I think Marriott dropped the ball on that and didn't think about that. They're about to get spanked.

Nope. My guess is that they will convert these certificates the same way they are going to convert free night credit card certificates.
FAQ

Explain? I think that also assumes old marriott TP categories do not have an adjustment when mapping to the new cats.

The official Marriott page doesn't refer to the Travel Packages, but I've now read a couple of the bloggers who have interviewed Marriott execs - they're all saying the TP's stay in some form.

So my guess is that there will be an adjustment on August 1st for any certificate sitting in your account that isn't already attached to a hotel stay. They just haven't officially said it yet.

I just am so damn curious about what the price changes are gonna be. Yeah they said more hotels will drop than will rise, but I'll believe it when I see it. God I hope travel packages stay alive and lucrative...

No idea how you came up with this. If you currently have a category 5 cert and book a category 5 hotel, you will get a 7 night stay in a category 5 hotel. After the massive devaluation, if you use your category 5 cert, you will get to stay 7 nights in a category 5 hotel. That is exactly the same value. The only difference is that Marriott is going to devalue their points, so you will (hopefully) get the benefit of 210,000 devalued points instead of 150,000 points at their current value. Potentially, if some of the comments are correct, you may even get screwed out of that, if they convert the 7 nights in a category 5 to 150,000 points of value based on their current chart and have to spend that certificate under their new chart, in which case you will only get 5 nights at that same category 5 hotel.

I agree that this is the most likely outcome. In likelihood, the new Category 5, while more expensive in points, will contain more or less the same hotels as the current Category 5. So for those of us with certs, our certs can still book the same hotels as now even though those hotels have increased in points cost.

It's hard, but not impossible, to see a situation where our certs lose value in these changes. They could change the certs to only apply to Categories 1-4 in the new award chart which could actually be a much smaller number of Marriott hotels than the current Category 1-5. I think they would avoid doing this though. It's also possible to see these certs increase in the value if they continue to be allowed for the new Cat 1-5 categories and the new Category 5 actually contains better hotels than the current Category 5.

I'd say in likelihood, it will be a wash or maybe a slight increase in value. Unlikely to be worse. There probably aren't enough of these certs on the books to justify the stink it would cause to devalue these certs.

If they do go with a point-based travel package, i would if it does make someone can stay for just a few nights only or > 7 nights up to the amount that your points allowance on the cert. If this is indeed the case, which might not be bad over all as every year for the last few years, I always end up using a 7-night cert on a 5-night stay while using a few 7-night certs for 2 to 3 weeks at a CAT 3. In those cases, the new rule might benefit me to allow me staying a high CAT for the 5 night and using a less cert for the long CAT 3 stay.

I would be surprised if all the R-C Tier 4/5 properties end up at 60K. I can imagine them sticking those kinds of properties along with St. Regis at the 70K peak rate for Cat7 temporarily, even though the peak pricing isn't going to be a thing until 2019. Dropping them to 60K until Cat8 exists would allow for some pretty ridiculous redemptions like the R-C Tokyo for 5 nights for 240K MR.

Do the nights from the package count toward status?

yes, it does count toward elite qualifying nights.

I have a cat 9 marriott 7 night cert in my acct... do i downgrade it to cat 1-5 and get the points back or keep it a cat 9?

Correct me if I'm mistaken, but award nights do not count towards elite qualifying nights for Marriott rewards program. Has it changed?