so in the wb hotbar graph when we cast to thirdperson and create a character ref. it would not read that ref inside the customevent updatehotbar. spent hours trying to figure out why my icons wouldnt show up. so on event construct right before you call update hotbar, drag from the set player ref get hotbar and set it to hotbar created in wb hotbar then call update hotbar. its really weird cuz when i unhooked the player variable from the beginning of the custom event and ran directly from the cast everything worked. i changed so many slot numbers lol i gotta take a break. but it now works as it should. so if anyone experiences this here you go