Can I procedurally animate first person arms?

If you don’t mind using plugins, you can with the Game Thread Rigs plugin.

Example use case here, the arms/hands are being driven procedurally from Blueprints/C++ using simple functions like “Set World Location” , but as an additive layer to anim BP. meaning you can have a breathing animation, or Walking Animation, and take exclusive control over the arms though(or any control/bones).

Plugin like: Game Thread Rigs Plugin