If I had to choose between a jetted tunnel boat or an airboat I would definitely choose an airboat. Nothing wrong with jetted tunnel scooters, but they do have limitations. Jets easily get clogged up with grass, seaweed, mud, and gravel. There is nothing to get clogged up on an airboat because the prop is not in the water. An airboat can go anywhere a jetted tunnel scooter can go plus it can run in rough water and on dry land. When you are running a jet boat in the marsh you have to be careful to always stay in a few inches of water; not so with an airboat. If you run an aluminum airboat with 3/8 poly on the bottom you can travel up and over dry oyster beds or dry gravel and shoot right back into the water without missing a beat.

It's all a matter of what's important to you.
I've had airboats, they don't particularly enjoy rough water at all. They rip through a fuel tank in a hurry, and it'll scare every redfish in a hundred yards.

Minor mods like removing the grates and a stainless impeller turns the jet into a weedeater, so grass isn't an issue, and I can idle right up on top of a red and they won't spook.

I think of it as what's your priority on a scale. Airboat is a 10 on the shallow scale, big v hulled tuna schooner is a 1. Everything that makes a boat run smooth also makes it run deep. You gotta decide what you're wanting to compromise on.

Unless your buddy looses his beer can and it goes through the cage..... ask me how I know.