From what I've seen, it seems to refer to more mobile champions, but I am unsure.
While plenty of mobile champions are more mechanically complex than others, not all mobile champions are mechanically intensive. Although, some non-mobile champions are pretty binary and I'm sure are exempt from having "outplay potential."
What do you define it as? Is mobility necessary, or is it possible to have "outplay potential" and not be mobile?
Troy2426213 votesHow many lines of play are available.
With a champion like Annie, you know exactly what she's going to do. Shaco, on the other hand? There's a LOT he can do.
That's not to say you can't outplay someone on an easy champion. Winning lane by virtue of just being a superior League player is still outplaying them. But the capacity each individual champion has is strongly correlated to how many choices they have at their disposal.
IcyPepper2 votesSo for mages, 
would have significantly more outplay potential than 
.
I see. That certainly explains why Zed is often cited, since his shadows are units that stay on the battlefield and increase his number of options, compared to let's say Katarina who isn't as complex.
MunchCrunchLunch2 votesmisused term often. go ahead and watch lcs or any of those. they call simply mehanics that the opponent can't really avoid outplaying. especially when its faker. on man he killed someone with his sand soldiers because he perma slowed them with rylais. outplayed. really.
to me outplaying is using champions mechanics. mobility. or other layers of gameplay. maybe dodging a skill because an ability that counters one another. or timing your combo in a way that your opponent messes up his.
outplay is for the most part when you are in a fight. that could go either way. but you did something other than simply doing damage to win the fight. a lot of it is kiting. sitting there and doing damage to kill people isn't outplaying
DrCyanide1 votesI've always thought of "Outplay Potential" as the ability for a champion to outsmart their opponent, with outsmart usually being either avoiding what the opponent is throwing at them or setting themselves up in a better position to throw stuff.
Stealth is a mechanic with a lot of outplay potential, regardless of mobility attached. There will always be assumptions made about which way the stealthed enemy ran, and as such the stealthed player can go someplace completely different to outplay the non-stealthed. When you know there's a stealth champion nearby and your skillshot hits them directly where you expected them to be, you outplayed them.
I think too often the term "outplayed" gets thrown around when there's nothing that can be done in a situation. My go-to example is Karthus vs any assassin. Karthus can't hard CC them, he can't dodge them, he can't deal damage as fast as they can, he's pretty much at their mercy, but the assassin didn't outsmart Karthus to get into that position, it's just the nature of their kits.
Albatrosspro1 votesYeah, it's an overused and misused term. It really only makes sense in a 1v1 universe, which is not what we're dealing with in 5v5 SR. Sometimes people are conserving mana or summoners because they know they are much more gankable that game than their opponent. Does that mean they get outplayed?
I think if you really want to translate this term to the team game, you have to just break it down as the ability to see risk-reward in every situation (all the more risk if you aren't coordinating with your teammates), and consistently make the "smart" choice. The only problem is, one person's risk-reward appetite is not the same as another's, and it's very difficult to pin a right or a wrong. I suppose, then, you can say that the person who consistently maximizes reward and minimizes risk is outplaying. (In fact, Riot has steadily increased the cases where risk and reward have an inverse relation, something that is highly dubious in game design and led to many of the balance shitshows we have now...)