Now, I'm only going to speak for myself here but I have to tell you. I don't find boat/airship rides that are longer then load screens immersive. they, in fact, are the opposite as I take the time imprisoned on them to make tea, phone calls or play with my cat.

People talk about immersion a lot without thinking of it as a personal experience much like fun. What is immersive for you is ruining immersion for me. So can people stop using it as a valid argument for one side of things or another? If they wanted me immersed in XIV they would get rid of the lag and take out all of the random farm animals doing nothing across the world. Maybe take out the copy paste and add some NPCs that travel the world.

That's why having both methods of transportation is a great thing. Even I enjoy riding them once, twice or even on a rare full moon. The rest of the time they kill my fun. Games shouldn't kill my fun =(