Yes, I agree that "WSDL First" is preferred for interoperability.
In this case, the SoapDocumentAttribute may be sufficient to do the job.  We
are talking only about the response element here.

Either way works.  The "WSDL First" approach is a bit of an uphill struggle
with the current set of tools.  For example wsdl.exe /server generates an
abstract class.  You might think to just inherit from this class and then
provide your concrete implementation, but this will not work, because the
.NET webservices runtime depends on the attributes being attached to the
class itself.  The .NET runtime will not interrogate and utilize the
attributes on the generated class, if you inherit from it.  So in effect you
must cut-and-paste all the attributes from the generated type into your
derived type.  Or, alternatively, modify the generated file to remove the
"abstract" and provide implementations directly.

In short, you have to "fight the tools" in order to practice WSDL first,
today.   So for this reason I recommend it for people who are comfortable
doing so, where interop is a key priority.

If it is just the substitution of one element name for another, then the use
of an inline attribute should be fine. And simpler.

-Dino