Before the haunt, can players agree to automatically crack the Vault?

Question

This came up while playing with a bunch of rules lawyers this weekend:

There doesn't seem to be anything in the rules that you must explore a new room every turn, or leave the room you're currently in, or prevent you from ping-ponging between rooms, or basically just waste your turn, which my question hinges on.

Consider the following scenario:

• a person discovers the Vault;
• that person has a high enough Knowledge trait that a 6+ roll is statistically possible;
• the Haunt has not begun yet, so there is no Traitor

The question is:

Based on the assumption that the player in the Vault is statistically guaranteed to open the Vault at some point in the future, can all players not in the Vault simply agree that they will all pass their turns until the Vault is unlocked? Basically guaranteeing an eventual successful unlocking of the Vault?

Or, to put it more succinctly: before the haunt, if all players agree, can a person in the Vault with enough skill to open it automatically open it?

I can imagine the characters sitting around in a haunted house, bored out of their minds, getting impatient, "Have you opened it yet?", the sun rises, and sets again, everyone is getting hungry, and the person in the vault says, "No, but I think I'm close!"

It seems kind of unsporting but it does run the risk of giving the traitor two sweet, sweet items, and I can't find anything that seems to prevent this.

Answer 1

You don't have to do anything on your turn, so if all players agree there's no reason you couldn't give the player who discovers the vault all the turns until they open it.

However, I'd suggest this is tactically a bad idea for the players not in the vault. Until the haunt starts you don't know who is on your team. An individual player could increase his or her own chance of winning by grabbing the sweet, sweet loot for themselves. It would make more sense for all the players who stood a chance of opening the vault to rush there as soon as it is discovered, personally I think that would be much more fun.

Answer 2

I don't see why not. Like you said, you're not forced to do anything useful. Besides, if everyone playing thinks this is the more fun way to play, then who cares what the rules say anyway.