A1： A photonic crystal can have many bands. But usually people are interested in the 1st and 2d band. I believe you will have your own purpose for simulation. Bandgap can be full or partial. Please check your own desire. Both dipole and monitor clouds are random to avoid possible issues.
Please get more information from the website, such as https://optics.ansys.com/hc/en-us/sections/360006919074-Photonic-crystals
A2: we have examples and script files for most cases. Please refer to the above link.
A3: the number of dipoles is to make sure all the bands can be excited, You can try different numbers if the band structures have issues, such as missing points, too many off band points etc. the monitor is the same.
A4: please refer to this exmple: https://optics.ansys.com/hc/en-us/articles/360042038473-Bandstructure-of-photonic-crystal-waveguide-Line-defect
Please check the settings. Might be the K vector values are wrong, or the k points do not applly to the dipoles. Please compare the settings of your file and the example.
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