water pump failure is usually detectable by the noise that it makes. it'll be noisy for a couple of month before actually failing.

my beat up myvi overheated twice. first time at the side of the road with my wife and kids inside and the radiator fan decides to fail. i was across the road buying food so can't monitor the temp.

the water boiled, backpressure into the reservoir causing it to pop open and the hot coolant overflowed to the hot engine causing massive white smoke.
got bystanders come out carrying fire extinguisher.

radiator fan failed after 5 years. replacement fan failed after 3 years. water pump is noisy after 8 years.
overheated twice but the head assembly didn't flex/bend so no water leaking into the engine.

overheating cause gasket failure because there's a high chance the head assembly will flex. so no matter if you use metal gasket, it doesn't avoid the gasket leaking problem if the cooling system is problematic.