crumera
Crucifier of Pixels
Think in general the pain and humilation aspect would be the most desirable in the fantasy
Impending death could be a part for some, but my guesstimation is that it is less important part of the package.
And with an avatar you can choose full pain and no mercy path and simulated death experience.
In BDSM and RP related stuff some people I know,
simulate their own execution without feeling cheated there is no "real" death waiting for them
Fantasy can be a great replacement for reality!
Impending death could be a part for some, but my guesstimation is that it is less important part of the package.
And with an avatar you can choose full pain and no mercy path and simulated death experience.
In BDSM and RP related stuff some people I know,
simulate their own execution without feeling cheated there is no "real" death waiting for them
Fantasy can be a great replacement for reality!
I'm not at all keen on the idea of being crucified myself, so perhaps I'm not the right person to answer this. I like to imagine crucifixion from the point of view of the subject, but that subject is someone else—say, the boy with the nice legs in the Greek restaurant the other day...
But even without a pain-reducer of the sort that @crumera describes, you really wouldn't be getting the full experience without the horror of impending death. The subject of a real crucifixion is probably going to go from "The pain is awful, but I really don't want to die" to "I'd welcome death as a relief, but there'll be hours more of this suffering before it comes." And before the crucifixion even begins, he's suffering the psychological torment of knowing that he's not only going to experience considerable pain, but that he's being put to death.