I am playing with topdown prototype atm.
I followed tutorial to setup character animation: https://docs.unrealengine.com/latest/INT/Gameplay/HowTo/CharacterMovement/Blueprints/Setup_1/index.html
It shows how to do it for third person, but from it i learned basics of animation. IT also shows how to make nice blend anim from Epic’s free anim pack.
When i had that tutorial working (and understood what each step does), i made topdown project, from scratch.
Player pawn is just spectator camera with move, rotate and zoom controls (later i make nice interface for it).
Player avatarts are actually AI pawns that i order directly from player controller. So they can navigate around obstacles, can get focal point or aim at enemy.
They also automatically strafe and move backwards, and its seamless animation (thanks to blend spaces from tutorial).
You are reinventing wheel doing it all manually when there is great system for character animation, and later behavior (like idle movement, turning head towards enemy etc.)