Totem, "Allies", and damage scaling

The skill description for Totems reads as follows:

"

Totems are allied constructs which use skills for you. Totems are not Minions and their skills benefit from your stats, though they have their own defensive stats and can be damaged or killed.

Totem Limit is shared between different types of Totem by default.

The definition of Allies is:

"

Your allies include other players, Minions, and any other entity that fights alongside you and has its own stats.

You do not count as your own ally.

Lastly, the new Tactician ascendancy node "Watch How I do This" reads:

"

Allies in your Prescence gain added Attack Damage equal to 25% of your main hand Weapon's Damage"

I understand from various creators & commenters that this node will not buff totems. Why?

Their explanation is something to the effect of "Totems have their own weapon and so don't benefit from your weapon's local damage modifiers." OK, I get that -- makes logical sense*

But where they lose me is the explanation that totem offensive scaling uses only your character stats. They don't have their own. Thus, according to this logic, they have no "Attack Damage" stat of their own to modify.

I simply do not understand what it means to not have their own offensive stats. I look at the skill and I see that it does benefit from the added flat damage from my rings and gloves. So apparently they do have their own attacks which I am able to modify with some gear.

Again, I understand them not benefitting from local weapon mods. But this interaction is just confounding to me. Help? Am I just missing something or does the system simply not function as one would expect given the available descriptions?

~~~~~~~~~
*side note, how in God's name is somebody new to PoE supposed to know the difference between local and global modifiers? Not just that they exist as a thing, but which is which?

Surely this is a bug. It feels in line with the warbringer answered call ascendancy that was hotfixed. Otherwise the wording is super misleading

I also stumbled upon this issue, and thus this thread. Why wouldn't Leercast unique helm provide a buff? Say's allies in presence. it gives 25% reduced damage to player but allies deal 50% increased damage (which sounds like 50% more damage).. what am i missing?

The way it reads they should benefit from "Watch How I Do This" and also Leercast.

can GGG explain? is it a bug or intended and just not described at all?

The best thing I've been able to come up with, from others explaining it to me, is that Totems are indeed Allies.

The one caveat that removes them from Ally buffs is that they are NOT Minions. Minions specifically benefit from Minion modifiers and only, ONLY use their own stats. Totems can pull from Totem modifiers and others (on the tree, etc.)

So, for instance, Shockwave Totem will be boosted by YOUR passive modifiers and Totem modifiers... This removes it from the Ally rule. Ancestral Warrior Totem is just a proxy of you. Yes, it uses it's own weapon, but again, is modified by your passives and such.

The descriptions definitely do not explain this well. Other players, they aren't taking your stats. Minions, they aren't taking anything other than Ally and Minion Stats.