I'm so confused

[darkscaryforest 1]

I'm a new player. This game just feels like a black box to me most of the time. When I have a problem or am successful at something, I only have concepts of the what or the how instead of solid knowledge of what is happening. I appreciate anyone who can help me understand more about the game with my current problems.

I have NAM installed as well as various fixes (including hi-tech fix, opera house fix). No CAM mod installed. I've started my first region. I built a city in one of the small squares. I completely covered it with a mix of residential, commercial, and industrial zones. It looks fairly successful at first glance since I have 120k sims, a large surplus of money, high education/healthcare/desirability, and traffic is under control by having bus stops and a subway along with the roads.

The problem is I have massive swathes of high-wealth, high density residential areas without jobs. Interspersed in these areas were buildings abandoned "due to commute time", but I suspect what that really means is "abandoned due to infinite commute time" aka no jobs. (Can anyone confirm if that's a real thing?) 

I wanted to say the issue was that I have high density residential stuff and low density industrial/commercial? I honestly don't know. What I mean is I mouse over a resident building and see spots for an insane 3000 people, where as I mouse over the biggest high-tech building I can find and it has like 100 jobs. Is it the case that way more of your land will be commercial and industry? I was kind of hoping I'd get very large workplaces too. I don't see how else I could raise the pop further otherwise.

Since I was out of land to build more stuff...I knew one way to fix this was to go to a neighboring region and build commercial/industry there. So I did...and it sort of worked? Maybe? I could build a few sections of hi-tech and commercial before the demand zeroed out next door. Then I would reload the main city, quit, then reload the neighbor and low and behold a little more would magically build. I repeated this like 30 times and now 1/3 of the neighbor city is filled with hi-tech/high wealth commercial with 0 residents. I can't tell if I just exploiting a bug here on accident or if you're supposed to reload repeatedly like this.

In main city, there are still a few places with no jobs, but I wanted to say that it worked and they are commuting.  However, then I noticed a NEW problem. Now, almost all of my existing hi-tech and commercial in the first city are abandoned due to low demand. These places were fine before. I'm assuming this is because of the neighboring region. I don't understand..I thought I was just filling in the jobs that were missing? Yet somehow I have supplanted jobs in the first city...

Was I wrong in thinking that I was filling in the missing jobs by building in a neighboring region? Maybe jobs are like pollution...trapped in the same city square

Maybe my issue is about this magical, nebulous growth stage I've heard about? Like if I go off and make 3 other 100k cities, and then reload my first one sky scrapers could pop up and solve these density problems?

I feel I don't have great control over this stuff. I just kind of float on vibes.
Thanks for any help. Like I've said I've watched tutorials but it really feels like there's a lot of black magic here.

[TheMurderousCricket 5,107]

First off, I would like to send you to this thread which I made when I was in the same spot that you are today. It revolves around numerous first-timer topics, which you might find useful. I hope you can find something for yourself!

2 hours ago, darkscaryforest said:

The problem is I have massive swathes of high-wealth, high density residential areas without jobs. Interspersed in these areas were buildings abandoned "due to commute time", but I suspect what that really means is "abandoned due to infinite commute time" aka no jobs. (Can anyone confirm if that's a real thing?) 

You are correct!  This message sometimes means that Sims simply cannot find suitable jobs.

Generally, the golden rule is to avoid laying out new zones, just because the demand is there. Treat it more like a supply, rather than an order... This is especially true of R$$$ citizens, the numbers of which are always low (as in real life).

2 hours ago, darkscaryforest said:

where as I mouse over the biggest high-tech building I can find and it has like 100 jobs.

This is unfortunately true and most of your population will work in the commercial sector. There are mods, however that double or quadruple the number of industrial workplaces. I don't have too much time now, but I can show you some, unless someone else chimes in earlier.

3 hours ago, darkscaryforest said:

I can't tell if I just exploiting a bug here on accident or if you're supposed to reload repeatedly like this.

SC4 strategy, indeed, involves visiting and revisiting various cities repeatedly. This way they exchange information, demand and workforce. 

3 hours ago, darkscaryforest said:

Was I wrong in thinking that I was filling in the missing jobs by building in a neighboring region?

In a way? You were. Again, just because demand is there, does not mean you should use it right away. In fact, in order to see some of the most impressive buildings in the game, you will have to save up demand up to 7000 units or more!! If you keep zoning, you will never see them, because the demand will be diluted into countless smaller buildings. Plus, you risk abandonment from negative demand...