Raid Awareness

It is a topic often screamed about over vent, especially after many wipes.
"Pay attention!" "Get out of the fire!" "Why the heck did you get cleaved?"
After a few of these, especially in pugs, you will often hear "Get out of my raid!" along with a raid removal.

So, how do we actually be more raid aware? How do you NOT be that n00b that is oblivious?
There are a few things to do, some easy, some simple, and some that come with observation (counterproductive if you aren't).

1) SEE THE FIGHT!
This sounds obvious, but for so many people, it isn't. You can't be aware of what happens around you when you can't see it!
So here's how:
a) Make your raid frames small, get them out of the way. If you're a healer, keep them semi out of the way, but not burried. You need to see, but if you're only paying attention to a small corner of the screen, you still won't.
b) Put away your meters. Seriously...if you do better dps when you see somebody is ahead of you...stop slacking and do better all the time. Meters will not help you do anything other than hide the fight.
c) Hide addons for buffing and other random displays...you don't need them during a fight, they just cover up what is happening around you.

2) KNOW THE FIGHT!
Yes, we all know the basics of a fight once we've seen it. Hit boss, stay out of fire, run to/away from this person when this happens. But what does it mean to really KNOW a fight?
a) Understand the abilities and how they work. This is simple, go read them on wowwiki. Knowing how slime spray works, or how defile works...will let you react to it in a more intelligent way, such as using nature resist aspects or rocket boots.
b) Use something like DBM (Deadly Boss Mods) to tell you when those abilities are happening. They don't just tell you the raid warning of "Defile on X" when you see a black puddle, they tell you exactly when this is going to happen. You can move the size and style of all those warnings so that they catch your attention at just the right time, but aren't in the way the rest.

3) FOCUS THE BOSS!
Target the boss and type /focus . I don't care if you are healing, dps, or a tank, this can save you lots of headaches. You will be able to see their casts...and if you're smart and have target of target turned on, you'll even see who the defile is being cast on before it happens. If it is you, you can know to run away from the raid even more than your typical spread. If it isn't, you can start to run back in to stay away from the person with the defile. If you're even smarter, you can set up macros that target your focus (or your focus' target) with abilities when a modifier key is held down. This is great when you need to dps one thing and cc another, or do fast target switching but still know if you can pop that aoe ability (like starfall) or if that will just push the boss into the next phase at a bad time.

4) REST!
Seriously. Get some sleep...the extra Red Bull and coffee you just had really don't help, and will be worse later. If you are rested you will be more alert, more reactive, have more stamina to focus, quicker reflexes, and a much higher mental capacity and state of thought.

5) DON'T BE EMOTIONAL!
This is a game. Yes, it is serious and people have more fun when things go down, and you don't want to be the one keeping it from happening. But in the end, it is just a game, so if you screwed up, don't worry about it...just keep performing as you know how. The time to get lost in thought and reflect on how to do better is not in the middle of the fight when malleable is coming at your face...that's the time to move. Reflect on how to do it better while you're collecting loot or doing the corpse run.

6) DON'T BE ON SOMETHING!
a) If you get off on your e-peen...don't be on it. How good you say you are doesn't matter, and it'll just piss people off. Besides, if you have to talk about it instead of it just being noticed, it isn't that big anyway.
b) Don't be getting high. Seriously...if you're high, just walk out and let somebody who doesn't know a thing and has blue gear take your place. They'll do better. This includes getting drunk, among other things.

7) LISTEN AND READ!
Your raid leader will be telling you things...either in raid chat/warnings or in vent. The boss and encounter will also tell you things in emotes and sounds. If you can't hear any of them over your music or see it through the spam on your screen...turn it down instead of rocking out and make a new chat frame with only the raid in it. Great music is great, especially when it puts you in just the right groove...but not at the expense of knowing that you got battle rez'd 2 minutes ago while you were looking at youtube, and you would've let the raid beat the enrage timer they just missed by 5 seconds.

Most fights have gimmicks in them. Most of those gimmicks are easy to avoid if you know their trick. If you have a clear screen they are easy to see. Most of those are easy to spot when you know what is going on. If you can't do any of that, mods, the game, and your raid lead will fill you in...though it'll be delayed. But you'll never be able to do any of that if you aren't rested enough to be alert and are of a clear mind.

The short version...DON'T BE A N00B!
Oh, and BTW...everything up there will also help your tanking or dps/healing output.