Propeller Rat

Propeller Rats are small, airborne enemies common in Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove and Shovel Knight Dig. They are brown rats with propellers strapped to their backs.

Variants

Treasure Trove

Propeller Rat

Regular Propeller Rats in Treasure Trove possess one hit point and deal half a damage point, and they can only slowly hover towards their target. In Shovel of Hope and Specter of Torment, they are often positioned in such a manner so that Shovel Knight or Specter Knight can Shovel Drop/Dash Slash into them to reach far-away places. When defeated, they fall off the screen while dropping a blue gem worth 5 gold.

Regular Propeller Rats in Shovel Knight Dig are redesigned and have two hit points instead of one, but otherwise act the same as in Treasure Trove. When defeated, they drop three green gems worth 1 gem each.

Scissors Propeller Rat

Scissors Propeller Rat are exclusive to the Xbox One and PC versions of Shovel of Hope, and can only be found in the Battletoads boss fight. They directly try to cut Shovel Knight's ropes during the Wookie Hole segment, when fighting Zitz, or to simply hurt him. These Propeller Rats are also the only enemies, besides the Beetos, that are able to be juggled. Doing so will progressively increase the value of treasure dropped, a reference to the original Battletoads video game, where enemies could be juggled for extra points.

Domino Dropper Propeller Rat

Domino Dropper Propeller Rats are also exclusive to the Xbox One and PC versions of Shovel of Hope. They appear in the Turbo Tunnel during the fight with Pimple, and carry small red domino-like walls to drop them at the end of the path Shovel Knight is driving on. The short walls can be difficult to avoid alongside tall walls, Birders, and ramps.

Rat King

The Rat King^[1] is a variant exclusive to King of Cards. It is a cluster of five Propeller Rats stuck together. As such, it must be hit five times to be fully defeated (one for each rat). Other than that, it's basically the same as a normal Propeller Rat.

Rat

Several Propeller Rats without propellers can be seen in the Homestead in King of Cards, some running amok and some caged in King Knight's secret room. They cannot be interacted with.

Propeller Rat Card

One of the Joustus cards in King of Cards is a Propeller Rat card which can push other cards up.

Rat King Card

One of the Joustus cards in King of Cards is a Rat King card which can push other cards up.

Dig

Bomber Propeller Rat

Bomber Propeller Rats only appear in Shovel Knight Dig. They appear to be able to drop bombs on Shovel Knight.

Trivia

The sprite model of the first three Propeller Rat variants are named "Flying Rat", "Flying Rat scissors", and "Flying Rat Domino Dropper", respectively.
Despite being rats, Propeller Rats are shown to posses a mildly high intelligence, as they are able to use scissors and can been seen attending Creech's bar in Specter of Torment.
The Rat King variant is a reference to the real life phenomenon of Rat Kings, an occurrence which was fittingly more frequent during the Middle Ages.
In Shovel Knight: King of Cards, once a fairy is chosen as The Fairy King in the Fairy Glade, all Propeller Rats will have fairy wings. This effect will go away after exiting to the title screen or relaunching the game.
Eight Propeller Rats are seen carrying the end of level Rat Rope. The secret red ropes use appropriately colored red Propeller Rats, which are not seen as an enemy in-game.