I did the Truk Odyssey last year and enjoyed myself immensely. The diving was emotionally inspiring, food very good, boat very nice, crew superb. The resort-well let's just say the word "resort" gets used too much. To be fair, I do not know all of the "resorts", just the one we stayed at while waiting for our trip. It was supposed to be one of the best.
I also did the Aggressor in Palau and loved every minute of that trip. We also stayed at the Palau Pacific Resort which was quite nice, except for the food-which was fair at best. The boat ride to some of the more popular places was about an hour +/- ea way. I prefer the liveaboard. Having said that, understand that when I travel 1/2 way around the world I want to be in the water. The liveaboards offer 5 dives a day in total comfort-eat/sleep/dive is their motto and it fits. In the 9 liveaboards from around the world that I have enjoyed, I have yet to miss a dive. So, I feel that it is worth the little extra you may pay. If you only want to do a couple dives then call it quits and just chill, you might just add up the numbers of what each offers and that may help your decision making. PS If you decide to go to Truk, I would be willing to send you a cd of u/w images I took set to music with 4 sec. images, that lasts for approx. 15mins. that will give you a heads up to what you will see. Regards,Wayne