Montage on Aim Offset Doesn't Play When Aiming Up

Youtube video I made that shows the issue: Aiming Up Montage Issue in Aim Offset - YouTube

There is no difference between the additive settings of any of the three aim directions (straight, up, down)
Just seems to not play the animation abruptly when the angle has exceeded ~45 degrees or something.

I’ve tried every combination of layered blend, additive blendspace, and aim offset suggested by all the other answers and forum posts on here.

I was also watching this video and he seemed to have the same issue (in the comments he mentioned it) years ago: Week 2: UE4.9 Using Anim Montage to play Rifle fire recoil/kickback animation - YouTube

Is this a bug? or am I missing something? Pretty stuck on it.

I’m an idiot, and my wife is a genius. She noticed that it was only happening when my aim was outside of the area, and into the sky… I was calling my events AFTER the line trace, so they only took effect if the trace was successful. FACEPALM