Well did some testing thanks to CPUID Hardware monitor.

Took some pre-game, immediately post-crash readings (had application running while game was running), and post-game "log out" readings.

Rational was that maybe the game was crashing due to over exertion forcing the dreaded "Death by Directx".
GPU temps (C)
pre-game = 41
post-crash = 70
post-game = 69

CPU temps (C)
pre-game = 50
post-crash = 78
post-game = 76

HDD temps (C)
pre-game = 43
post-crash = 40
post-game = 42

The temps could not have changed that much before i got them. The windows pop up for "Display driver NVIDIA Windows Kernel Mode Driver, Version 296.10 stopped responding and has successfully recovered." had not disappeared yet.

Testing for same duration then logging out however yielded semi-inconclusive results. The temperatures were very close to the crash temps. So next time I am going to play around with settings some more. I do not feel comfortable joining a pt until i get this figured out. The shut downs are just too random atm. The saga continues...