How is the build diversity / "mandatory" skills in this game?

So I have not played this game "yet", it looks absolutely amazing but I'm going to wait for the Feb launch before diving in, I come from PoE which I believe a lot of players interested in this game does, and what I'm wondering is if there's a lot of these "mandatory" skills for builds

What I mean with this isn't if it's possible to play without them, but with how much you'd purposely gimp yourself by playing without them

Let me give an example, I'm playing around in the skill builder for this game for the first time, and I'm currently looking at Beastmaster, and I immediately noticed the "Summon Frenzy Totem".

And that feels like a prime example of a mandatory skill in a pet build, without ever testing it. I can imagine you'll be crippling yourself by a lot if you don't use this skill in a pet build, and there is nothing I hate more in ARPGS than totems. And you'll probably be fine without it, but at a noticeable slower speed than if you'd use this skill, in any pet build variation possible.

Am I wrong? I'm not trying to hate or mean anything negative towards the game, I'm just curious as a soon to be new player