I'm not exactly sure what you want to define as "too much" mana efficiency, but I would like to point out that the three champions you specifically noted are heavily balanced based on their wave clear, whereas Vel'Koz's laning presence comes primarily from his poke. If Vel'Koz had the same "mana efficiency" as Anivia, Aurelion, and Talon, not only would he have to deal with the fact he's going to get outpushed by these matchups in the lane where priority is arguably the most important, but he also has to deal with the fact that his primary forms of poke are, as you pointed out, rather dodgable. This is opposed to the fact that wave clear is incredibly reliable since minions don't intentionally dodge skill shots.
In other words, for any individual uses of their abilities, Vel'Koz's Q+W Waveclear is lackluster compared to Anivia's Q+R (granted, pre 6 discussion but still a factor), Aurelion's P+Q, and Talon's W+Tiamat. Vel'Koz must then approach the lane with his element of Poke, which I think we can all agree is at the very least much less reliable than Waveclear in and of itself. Again, I have no stance on what you consider as "too much" mana efficiency, but is it possible that for Vel'Koz's lackluster wave clear and less reliable poke he should have more mana efficiency to balance everything out?