okay so here's the results of my endeavors so far.
since my textures absolutely will not show up in DTW, i switched to opening these files in a hex editor:
-IfAll.usd from an absolutely unmodded melee filesystem
-IfAl0.usd from vanilla 4.05 root files
-IfAl1.usd from vanilla 4.05 root files
-MnSlChr.usd from vanilla 4.05 root files
the only ones that matter are the IfAll.usd and the IfAl0.usd, since IfAl0.usd is the one that determines the stock icons, as i discovered. however, what i did changed the stock icon in all the files quite strangely. essentially, i found that the offset and following block which contains red ness's stock icon, 0xc4c80 until the beginning of 0xc4da0, had the same string of hex as the corresponding block in BOTH IfAl0.usd and IfAl1.usd. also, the same string of hex appears at the offset 0x378020 in MnSlChr.usd.
original block of hex:
so, i thought, if i simply replace its texture with my desired texture in DTW and then copy the new block of hex into IfAl0.usd, it should work.
new block of hex:
so i did this, and i got a very weird result:
this is the image i'd like to replace it with:
this is the image i got:
anyone know what the issue is?
EDIT: i always seem to solve my own issues after posting. i never copied the palette data over so it was reading from the original ness stock icon palette