1. A method for execution by one or more processing modules of one or more computing devices of a centralized digital video storage (DVS) system that supports a plurality of subscriber devices, the method comprises: storing, for playback, a plurality of sets of encoded data slices in storage units of the centralized DVS system, wherein multi-media content is dispersed storage error encoded using a pillar width number of “n” and a decode threshold number of “k” to produce the plurality of sets of encoded data slices, and wherein “n” and “k” provide a certain number of unique combinations of the decode threshold number of encoded data slices per set of encoded data slices of the plurality of sets of encoded data slices; monitoring the storage units for a failure mode; monitoring a number of subscriber devices requesting at least partially concurrent playback of the multi-media content; determining based on a number of the storage units in the failure mode, the pillar width number and the decode threshold number, and the number of subscriber devices whether a sufficient number of the unique combinations exists to service playback of the multi-media content for the number of subscriber devices; and when the sufficient number of the unique combinations do not exist to service the playback of the multi-media content for the number of subscriber devices, reassigning the unique combinations of the decode threshold number of encoded data slices per set of encoded data slices of the plurality of sets of encoded data slices to some of the subscriber devices based on subscription priority level such that reliable playback service of the multi-media content is provided to the some of the subscriber devices.