as you know i dont take mod requests, but if you want to try it yourself i would explain everything necesary ^^

You can try to, but I have no experience with modding itself... Managed to change cockpits in X3AP for different cockpits in the cockpit mod, and opened the .cat files of Rebirth to have a look at the files, but that's pretty much everything I reached

ok, then lets beginn ^^

first step is always to create a new Extension:
-> Create a new Folder in your Extensions Directory
(name if like you want, i would suggest a Prefix based on your Name and then a short Mod Name)
-> copy a content.xml over another mod to this new Directory
-> change Values in this File to your liking, but especially edit the id="****"-Arrtibute because the Game uses this one to distinguish between Extensions
=> done.™
(that part is always the same for all Extensions ^^)

now the interesting part: actually add Content to the Mod
First: get a unchanged Copy of your desired Ship in the Game:
-> for that first copy over the Ship Data of the Ship you want the Player to put into
(for the katana, which is calles "units_size_m_canteran_01_macro" internally that would be the Files: assets\units\size_m\units_size_m_canteran_01.xml and assets\units\size_m\macros\units_size_m_canteran_01_macro.xml)
for consistency i suggest to also keep the Folder Structure (inside your mod ofc) ;)
-> now rename these Files in the File Name and in the File itself to something like
unit_player_ship_katana(_macro)
there are 5 Places where the Name has to be changed: component File Name and File Content, Macro File Name and File Content, and also the component reference in the Macro
(dont change the geometry source path in the component - you just want to make the katana player-compatible so you can simply refer to the Vanila files for the model Data ;) )
-> as last step register these new Files for usage by the Game
for that create a new Directory called "index" in you mod Folder and put in there these two files:
components.xmlmacros.xmlyou can also use xml diff files for that, but for adding under the root node i think its better to use merge files because its clearer ^^
=>done.™

Second: put the Player in this Ship in a new Gamestart for testing and add missing things to make this Ship Player compatible
-> first create a libraries-Folder in your Extension and create a "gamestarts.xml" there with the following content:=> at this point you can already access the Ship InGame, but it will almost surely fail because it is missing things
to fix that open the assets/units/player/macros/unit_player_ship_macro.xml and the assets/units/player/unit_player_ship.xml
and add the Things missing in the Katana by copying them over from the player Ship component and macro (this is the tricky part ^^)
make sure to activate the debuglog file when testing so you can fix all issues the game complains about ^^
also many coordinates in the component file wont fir to the Ship, so you have to re-arrange some stuff probably ^^

Managed to do everything, but this:

Originally posted by UniTrader:

and add the Things missing in the Katana by copying them over from the player Ship component and macro (this is the tricky part ^^)
make sure to activate the debuglog file when testing so you can fix all issues the game complains about ^^
also many coordinates in the component file wont fir to the Ship, so you have to re-arrange some stuff probably ^^

Iam completly confused when I open the playership and playershipmacro files. I don't have a clue which lines I have to copy, which ones to delete, which ones to replace.
Tried some random stuff, but the test gamestart never starts, only kicks back to menu.