You are in a very good position to cripple the Scipii. Basically if thier armies don't want to fight keep taking thier towns but leave them with a standing army so they are economically deveastated. After that leave an army or 2 there to ward off the Scipii and take the war to Italy.

Even on very hard you can devastate the A.I.'s economy with this tactic. The A.I. can only cheat so much.