There is one supported installation configuration that when specifying the "Existing resource pool", we could set "vSphere vCenter Cluster" with "ReadOnly" permission and NOT propagate to children:  
See "Required permissions and propagation settings" in https://docs.openshift.com/container-platform/4.14/installing/installing_vsphere/installing-vsphere-installer-provisioned.html 
 
With such configuration, the CollectNodeESXiVersion check failed in vsphere-problem-detector due to host privilege lack, it reports:
I1218 15:01:07.716590       1 vsphere_check.go:287] CollectNodeESXiVersion:wduan-vsphere-qj6f6-master-1 failed: failed to load ESXi host host-7016 for node wduan-vsphere-qj6f6-master-1: NoPermission
 
 
I tried the following ways to eliminate this failure and make the check works:

1. Set "vSphere vCenter Cluster" with "ReadOnly" permission but need to propagate to children (User might "see" more resources than existing resource pool)
Or 

2. Set all related host as "ReadOnly" permission" (Additional permissions which doesn't mention in doc)

I think finally we might need to update our doc, but before that, I would see Dev's options.
 

4.15

Always

See Description

The vsphere-problem-detector could not check the ESXi Version

The vsphere-problem-detector should be able to check the ESXi Version, it is an important checkpoint.

vCenter version: 7.0.3-19717403
EXSi version: 7.0.3