Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove

Not really a guide, but more so pointers on how I did it:

First and foremost, you will need to do this on a new file, NG+ Keeps the play time from your previous play through as well as your new one. It's best to do all of your practicing on a complete file.

Try your best to avoid the wandering traveler fights on the world map, it's time you could better spend elsewhere.

Practice each level multiple times (obviously). Know where the health is, know the main path and don't stray.

Only do the story mission levels.

Learn the boss patterns well. Know all of their moves, know what to anticipate.

Skip nearly all relics, they tend to be far off the beaten path, and you don't need them all.

The only relics I will suggest are the Phase Locket, which you buy in the village, and the Mobile Gear, which you'll find in clockwork tower.

The Phase Locket will make most boss fights easier if you tend to get hit alot, and is almost necessary for Plague Knight, Polar Knight, and the Enchantress' first form.

The Mobile Gear cuts down a lot of time spent waiting during the horizontal elevator part in clockwork tower, and reduces the Tinker Knight battles to only his second form if you hit him with it immediately after the fight with his first form begins.

Addition from Sakori
If you decide to skip all of the relics, you should still have enough time to get this achievement and the "True Shovelry" achievement.

I know it seems crazy, but only visit town to upgrade your health twice.
After you defeat King and Spectre Knight, you get a free meal ticket, and that plus the gold you have (you should easily have at least 6K) from the first three levels will get you three upgrades between the goatician and the gastronomer.
You also get a free meal ticket after you defeat Plague, treasure and Mole Knight, so make sure you have another 6K in gold and you can get two more upgrades which are plenty to get you through the game. This time, use the shortcut trebuchet to get back to town to avoid any wandering traveler fights.

And last but not least, if you die thirty seconds or more after the most recent checkpoint, just pause the game, arrow all the way down to "Return to Title Screen", and select your playfile. If you reset in this manner, it won't resave the time where you're currently at, you will start at the play time you had just before you started the level.

DO NOT HIT RETURN TO MAP! It saves your play time every time you return to the map, no matter if you're returning from finishing a level or rage quitting.

Hopefully these tips helped, and feel free to hit me with an upvote, and send me a message me if you have any level specific questions, I'm glad to help.

Addition from Slayer1331fan
Here's a great speedrun video for some visual help. Not my video.

So here is a playthrough of myself going for the Hurry Up achievement.

I HEAVILY save abuse as I'm trying to get the lowest time I can but I lack the skill to do a clean deathless run.

In the video I can be seen quitting over and over to regain my time OR to get the NPCs on the map to move locations. AVOID EVERY NPC possible. You don't want to die in those and it's an instant save when you are kicked out. You want all the time you can possibly save.


Every time you enter AND exit a stage is when the game saves. It takes me 1h 56m minutes to finish the game but my actual game time comes out to 1h 27m due to save abusing which is under an Hour-Thirty thus unlocking the achievement.

THE PHASE LOCKET IS YOUR BEST FRIEND! Get that. Abuse that! If you're like me and you abuse your locket as much as I do then your next best friend will be Purple Armor. You lose extra health with this armor but if you're a phase locket abuser that isn't too big a deal.

The Mobile Gear is a 1 hit Kill for Tinker Knights first form. So it would be in your best interest to make sure you acquire that too.


So the video is a Twitch Highlight. I'm talking during gameplay but i's basically conversation with my Xbox Live party and my Twitch Chat. The playthrough does however hold a decent route (not even close to perfect but I decent one to where you can earn the achievement and grab some upgrades at the same time)

Most people advise skipping most upgrades which is RECOMMENDED however I'm not the best Shovel Knight player so I took extra steps which almost caused me to not earn the achievement.

If you feel those extra steps are needed please do them as it makes the game less frustrating. Please be quick about any detour you make and DO NOT take your time when buying upgrades. Get in get out. It is a huge time waster buying upgrades but if you're like me and needed extra health then you gotta do what you gotta do.


In the video I buy a shovel upgrade at one point. DO NOT DO THAT. In the video I even admit that was a stupid mistake on my part and was a waste of time.

Be quick and abuse your saves. This video is not a proper speed run it is a run that it's sole purpose is just to earn the achievement.

My advice for getting this achievement (more relevant if you're familiar/comfortable with using standard speedrun strats) is to simply never go out of your way for ANYTHING, the only items I collected were the flare wand (fireball stick) and phase locket.

DO NOT waste time buying the troupple chalices, because not only are you slowing your run down while going through the dialog buying them, but the ridiculously long sequence you must watch the first time you fill them up can DESTROY your time. (it's over a minute long)

If you plan to use meal tickets then use as many at the same time as possible, this saves you trips to/from town as well as keeps you from having to watch the cook's animation more than once.

If you're comfortable destroying checkpoints destroy every single one that you feel confident you will be safe breaking, more money=more mana=faster boss kills.

I used these strategies on my first attempt and finished with a whopping 1:15:03, and I died a couple of times during that run, as long as you are always aware of how much time your choices will consume and are at least an average player, you should have absolutely no problem getting this achievement.