If you check the Linksys threads over the past few years you'll see plenty of WRT54Gs that were bricked as well. The reports of bricks are I'm sure a small percentage of installs on both devices. While you can't go wrong with the GL, you are giving up 5.0ghz dual band - the Linksys WRT610 would be a similar device that can also be flashed to DD-WRT. They also recently released the 620 which is a strange derivative - its dual band with a single radio. Personally I like the flexibility of configuring the radios separately.
As for the OF - I couldn't get it to connect to the WRT54G that runs DD-WRT in client-bridge mode. I have no idea why. As soon as I flashed DD-WRT to the WNDR3300 the bridge was recognized. There's one other non-obvious bonus to the DD-WRT firmware on the WNDR3300 - it disables the blue disco dome lights.
There's one other non-obvious bonus to the DD-WRT firmware on the WNDR3300 - it disables the blue disco dome lights.
Ha, Ha, I forgot to mention those annoying blinking blue lights. That was another reason I didn't like the router I could not find any way to turn them off.
If you upgraded the router to the new version of the Netgear firmware then shutting them off was easily accomplished by pressing the dome - it functions as a switch. From what I've read in the DD-WRT forum, the control of those lights would require a custom script to function in DD-WRT as they do in the OF. Supposedly they light to illustrate which of the internal antennas is active in realtime.