Totem Warriors - Too

So I went on the boards (diamondthrone.com) and came up with a couple of ideas.

The Totem Warrior might have an actual totem of some sort (medium sized item in the form of her Totem Animal), this gives the TW access to their spirit guide. I am thinking of something like what Homer encountered on the Simpson's episode where he ate El Chile Loco (grown only in the graveyards of insane asylums). It might have some analog in native american religion as well.

The Spirit Guide will be a wise spirit able to give helpful (or puzzling) advice, intervene in some stylistical appropriate ways ( A bear spirit might cause salmon to jump of the river into the characters hands, a raven spirit might reveal what can be seen from far above, a snake spirit might heal some poison damage, etc..)

The spirit could on occasion summon similar creatures to help the character fight, or do other tasks (a wolf could track for the character, a shark pull a raft) using abilities appropriate to the class level of the TW. These would be mostly up to the DM but roughly as useful as having a companion animal around all of the time.

What do you think?