problem with C++/CLI assemblies and #using as_friend; disabling automatic reference to dlls

[trebahl]

So, I have two C++/CLI projects A and B. The output of A is stored in a nuget package consumed by B. Where the fun begins is that in B, the dependency to A.dll needs to be specified by means of a #using <A.dll> as_friend in the source code.

When I specify a dependency to the nuget package A, a dependency to A.dll is added automatically at compile time. This is the normal behaviour but it is causing the using as_friend to be ignored, which prevents my code from compiling.

Is there a way in PackageReference to say "ok, I want to extract the contents of package A in $(TargetDir), but please don't add a reference to A.dll?