Shapeshifter Villains

[Spiritchaser]

I’ve only ever done shapeshifters as singular arch villains, I’ve never tried doing a group before, however:

How could a group like this fit into the larger meta plot of your campaign?

These guys are going to be pretty potent, and as deceivers and manipulators, could be well suited to shifting the politics of a region. Do you have regional powers in conflict?

Here’s a potential twist: two regional powers are engaged (or are about to be engaged in) a long running conflict that brings all the horrors of war (Add reasonably legitimate cause for strife). More importantly to the cabal, it’s going to make it impractical to mine down and excavate an ancient <unpronounceable> buried beneath the borderlands.

The cabal has chosen to infiltrate the regional powers, stop the war, free up the site of the old <unpronounceable> spend a few years (or months, whatever fits your timeline) excavating it, then cackle maniacally as the <unpronounceable> does <whatever it does>

You can have the cabal engage the players in helping stop a war

You can have multiple reveals. The party could discover that some of the less careful members are really interested in a “mine” after the peace... even then the PCs might agree to work with them, as a greedy bastard who wants to make a profit from peace isn’t obviously evil. In fact, having one cabal member be”all about the mine” right from the beginning might be more interesting narratively... and the cabal can use them as a foil to gain support for peace from those who might profit from the mine. Subsequent reveals that these members are shapeshifters can raise the stakes. A final revelation about the fact that the mine isn’t a mine, but actually the buried ruins housing the terrible <unpronounceable> should be possible as well.

If you carry this long enough you could even have a last battle in the ruins deep below the surface, desperately trying to stop the <unpronounceable> from doing <whatever it does>.

At the very least they can wrestle with the problem of killing the evil that is stopping the war.

Edit: almost forgot: the cabal could all wear amulets/pins/broaches/whatever which are similar and can be open or hidden, depending on how easy you want to make this (easier is usually better) these devices must be regularly sprinkled with 25gp worth of diamond dust every 8 hours or so (which is consumed) to maintain their magical effect: nondetection.