I have removed master node from the list of nodes by setting executors number to 0. After such operation projects which had their last build performed on the master node began failing when polling:

{{
Started on Mar 10, 2011 8:33:50 AM
ERROR: Failed to record SCM polling
java.lang.NullPointerException
at hudson.model.AbstractProject.poll(AbstractProject.java:1276)
at hudson.triggers.SCMTrigger$Runner.runPolling(SCMTrigger.java:420)
at hudson.triggers.SCMTrigger$Runner.run(SCMTrigger.java:449)
at hudson.util.SequentialExecutionQueue$QueueEntry.run(SequentialExecutionQueue.java:118)
at java.util.concurrent.Executors$RunnableAdapter.call(Executors.java:441)
at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask$Sync.innerRun(FutureTask.java:303)
at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask.run(FutureTask.java:138)
at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.runTask(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:886)
at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:908)
at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:619)
}}