They should have the ability to adjust to even out demand. DVC has had several such adjustments over the past couple of years and one some time ago. As a buyer, you need to know about these options and you can't count on the sales staff to fully inform you. It comes down to you have to read the paperwork line by line. CI is an extreme (but good) example because they do not have a home resort priority AND have resorts with a significant seasonal demand variability. This is in part why I stated that Marriott really had to have at least some type of home resort priority and to get certain owners to convert, will likely need a season priority and possibly a view priority.
I would expect the points were a reflection of the market evalation for the underlying value, just like it would be for the prices of a weeks based system. That doesn't necessarily mean it's accurate or workable, see Crystal shores list prices.
ANY timeshare reservation system is owner against owner to a degree, even in my example above, I'd be competing with other owners who own exactly what I do. Technically this is no different with ANY points system. The numbers and relative chances of you or I getting what we want may vary and I think the fear many here have is that they will have less chance of getting what we want in such a points based system because we've played the game well the way it was set up. Such adjustment options are really important to the health of a points based system because it allows you to actually alter and even out demand of a given time. It is healthy for a resort to have a fairly even demand throughout the year. Perry, my suspicion in your case is that your fear is not of the functioning of the system itself, but in your exchange options (they are separate), or lack of going forward. While I too have weeks I own specifically for internal exchanging, it is not Marriott's responsibility to provide those options to you or I. Such adjustment options are really important to the health of a points based system because it allows you to actually alter and even out demand of a given time. It is healthy for a resort to have a fairly even demand throughout the year.
One correction Doug, DVC did shift recently a fairly large reallocation which had to be done over 2 years due to the limitation of no more than 15% change per year. However, points for specifics weeks can and did change, it's only the points for the entire resort that must remain the same (not even for a given unit size). It's a little more technical than that but that gives you the end product.
None of us know what will happen. I doubt Summit Watch Gold will be toast, I actually suspect it'll fare good to very good on the other side, if you can feasibly get there. So since it seems we agree on the fact that it's you against me (figuratively) now and will be with any new system, all the remains is the relative chances of a given reservation for a specific situation and whether we can/should change from one to the other. I have no doubt that those on this thread will be able to make any system work once a participant but that doesn't mean the new system will work better or that it will be worse, we simply don't know at present.
Don't go there with the conspiracy theory again, it undermines your credibility. Do realize though that a points system has the ability to even out demand across even low demand times and this comes with a potential variable that we don't face now with Marriott, that it's POSSIBLE that the rules could have a built in likelihood of changing over and above the other long term timeshare variables. It really depends on how they set it up. If they link the points to a given unit type owned, they likely will not have this option as a possibility. If they model it after CI and what they have already with the Asia points option where the points are held in trust and there is no home resort priority or even a more strict season type of priority, this would be very likely to be included IMO. And if they do, it's likely they will have new resorts and those still in active sales with a sizable inventory with this option and those that are nearly or sold out, set up a different way.
I'm not saying they will, only that it's possible and it's the only way I see they could convert over resorts that are sold out to a true trust based generic system. They could still convert the segments for those that have converted if they signed up for it but not completely if they match dues to points rather than dues to a week/season. And pointing out that there would be pretty stringent requirements to convert an entire existing resort, I'm just not sure what the level of requirement is and I'm too lazy to go digging through my POS info for any of my resorts to check it out.
Perry mentioned Club Intrawest which I understand had a far greater alteration for some weeks. Personally I want a system that runs efficiently and manages their resources. To me it was DVC's responsibility and ? legal requirement to reallocated given their setup and the shift in demand over the years. One of the reasons the shift was so large was they had put it off too long. The info I had suggested they should have had enough information to plan the change from 1999 to 2000 and implement it in 200-2001 rather than 2009. But they did likely go overboard in the weekend vs weekday adjustments and one must ask WHY. They also will almost certainly have to adjust some seasons as well, esp early and mid December.