I have the same setup as you do... cable modem -> ddwrt.. one nic in my core... here is what you need... I'm gonna give you my ip scheme...on your ddwrt router, the internal address is (192.168.1.1).. turn off dhcp, point dhcp server to (192.168.1.2) which is the "external" address of your core (eth0)
on the core, eth0 (external) is like I said before 192.168.1.2, then the (internal) address is 192.168.80.1 on interface eth0:0 which is the same single nic.... then on the core, set your gateway as 192.168.1.1 which is your ddwrt router...
your devices will pull a dhcp address of 192.168.80.* with a listed gateway of 192.168.80.1... however the core has a gateway of 192.168.1.1 (ddwrt router) so your devices on the 192.168.80.* subnet will still be able to get out on the internet because it is routed through your ddwrt...