Ok so I've made a few threads to do with my RMAed GPUs over the past months and I stumbled into another problem. While I was playing Garry's Mod on a TTT server called Gentleman-Gamers and the server uses a BF4 Hud thing and keep in mind I play Garry's Mod alot and I sometimes check the MSI Afterburner readings and they are always fine, GPU at 45c always while playing TTT or DarkRP gamemodes but 20mins ago I joined this server https://www.gametracker.com/server_info/ttt.gentlemen-gamers.com:27015/
and I checked my MSI Afterburner readings and I had some random heat spikes on my GPU and I could hear the GPU fan change speed when I holded TAB to see the scoreboard, so I kept the scoreboard up for 10 seconds and then checked the readings again and the GPU went from 45c to 69c in that space of time, also the GPU usage spiked around 98%, What could cause the GPU to do such a strange thing Garry's Mod is not a high end game.
 
If anyone plays Garry's Mod would you join that server and hold TAB to see the scoreboard and check the activity it does to your GPU to see if it's not just me with this problem, I'm sick of sending GPUs back to EVGA I've had 2 RMAs already. I'll try and dare go back to that server and get a screenshot of the MSI Readings if needed.
 

Sajin
Nothing wrong with using 98% of the GPU. 69C is perfectly fine too.

But it's strange for a simple BF4 style Scoreboard for a Garry's Mod TTT server to put that much stress on a GPU in that short of time, and that was only having it up for 10secs I wonder what it would have been if I was looking at it for 1 min. If anyone reading this who has Garry's Mod please join that server test it out for me, if it happens to everyone else I would feel at ease also I would recommend people not go onto that server if it happens to everyone, too bad for the server owner put your players first before adding pointless stuff like that to the server.

MrSharpy
But it's strange for a simple BF4 style Scoreboard for a Garry's Mod TTT server to put that much stress on a GPU in that short of time, and that was only having it up for 10secs I wonder what it would have been if I was looking at it for 1 min. If anyone reading this who has Garry's Mod please join that server test it out for me, if it happens to everyone else I would feel at ease also I would recommend people not go onto that server if it happens to everyone, too bad for the server owner put your players first before adding pointless stuff like that to the server.

Very simple things can cause big issues.   Feel free to google "starcraft 2 no frame limit title screen" if you have some time.  This doesn't directly relate,  but it does tell you to be cautious if you notice abnormal performance issues.
 
A short very generalized version of that story,  "idling at menu screen fried player's graphic card". 
 
-there is plenty of blame put around when that occured.  I look at it as the hardware manufacturer and Blizzard both at fault.
 
-no matter what settings/config you run a program,  software should never be able to cause damage to the hardware. 
AND for blizzard to overlook such a basic thing like a frame limiter is also bad.
(there were no issues in other areas of the game.  it just seems that nobody thought to test through something as simple/generic as a menu screen.) 
 
So you are concerned about your card with heat and longevity of course.  If it is an isolated incident,  then stay away from those type of "modded" servers like you mentioned.