The issue is that due to udev being a dynamic system, nodes are wiped and re-created in /dev each boot. So the simple solution is to get the VMware init script to check for and re-create the nodes as required:

Add the following just under the start) line in /etc/init.d/vmware

   start)
# Start insert
      if [ ! -e "/dev/vmmon" ]; then
         mknod /dev/vmmon c 10 165
         chmod 600 /dev/vmmon
      fi
      for a in `seq 0 9`; do
         if [ ! -e "/dev/vmnet$a" ]; then
            mknod /dev/vmnet$a c 119 $a
            chmod 600 /dev/vmnet$a
         fi
      done
# End insert
      if [ -e "$vmware_etc_dir"/not_configured ]; then

Which recreates the nodes that are required – just need VMware to pick that up for future versions. Remember, you’ll still need to re-run vmware-config.pl after a kernel upgrade.