Are loot drops completely random or is it possible to 'outlevel' certain gear?

Since this game plays very much like SWTOR but with better graphics, yes, you absolutely can outlevel certain gear drops. Inquisition was made by the same big brained bioware team that went back and messed with the gearing system several times over the years in Swtor. In swtor this severely handicaps your ability to get base game armor for the fashion endgame. So you won't be able to get some flashpoint specific gear like athiss enforcer unless you start a new character or other basic world drops like the republic trooper armor drops on corellia, if your character's level is over the 50-55 range.

There is no doubt they also added this ass backwards "progression" system to inquisition as well since they implemented this same kind of gearing system in swtor around the same time Inquisition was being developed around 2015-2017.