Am trying to add spells to a class, and not make them always prepared. for SOME reason, despite the fact that i set the "always prepared" option to no when adding them as a class feature, it doesnt work and makes them prepared. they also dont appear in the "known" spells despite me setting the "counts as known" to yes, so i cant change their prepared status there either.

There isnt a way to do what you are trying to do with a homebrew subclass. The tools aren't designed to do it, because they have never had to for official content.

You can add spells to a spell list without auto preparing it by making a copy of the spell and adding that spell to the class spell list or by using a homebrew background that adds the spell to the character's spell lists.

That just confuses me as to why they give you the option to make it always prepared or not when adding it via a class feature in the first place, if that option does literally nothing.

but, in the end, you helped with my issue regardless. thanks!

Some of the tools are left over from changes they've made to them. When the homebrew tools were first made, they weren't intended to be homebrew tools. They were the tools the team used to add official content, so it was fine if they were clunky to use.

They are planned to be removed and replaced with a new set of tools properly designed to be used for homebrew.