Some final code requests (and screenshots)

Ok, so I took a look at 013d with Relm on another save file in which she has dog block applied, and there was indeed a 40 there instead of 00.  However, when I edit my own save file and put the 40 there, the save no longer appears in-game; it is completely blank.  I am guessing there is some other value that has to be changed somewhere in this case.

I forgot, there is a checksum for the save file. If you change a byte the checksum is no longer valid so the game do not show that save. What you could do is edit while you play $00173D or $7E173D in the RAM viewer of bsnes+ or snes9x debugger and then save your game.

Hah, that surprisingly did the trick, thanks!  I couldn't find the debugger of Snes9x or the RAM viewer of bsnes, but I easily found a memory viewer in SnesGT (which is my favorite emulator for testing).  After modifying that byte, saving the game, and transferring it to my Everdrive - Relm now has the dog without me losing hours of progress.