I reverted back to 3.7.2 (which was the last version of VP I was on, and didn't notice any problems).
I have run the game for a full day with lots of play, not a single crash so far. On 3.7.7 I was getting a rendering error crash every 30 min to an hour or so.
I will keep it going to see if that changes, but as now I do beleive there is some problem introduced that is causing my problem, as this is the only thing I have changed.
If I were to take a guess at what might have caused it, it would be this change:
"Merged (4a) Promotion Icons for VP mod into (2) Vox Populi"
As that is the only one dealing with artwork, which I assume would be a factor in a directx rending crash